  As education systems move toward business models of operation, there is a
strong tendency to misidentify the student as the customer. Misidentifying the
student as the customer leads to interpretation of the course credit or degree
as the product. The true product is the additional knowledge, skill, and
ability that course credit and degree should represent. Consequences are
potentially disastrous, because the notion that "the customer is always right"
can lead to the perceived product (course credit or degree) meeting the desires
of the misidentified "customer" (student) rather than the real product (value
added to student) meeting the standards of the properly identified customers
(future employers and taxpayers).
