Name of Professor Essay Example

  • Category:
    Education
  • Document type:
    Article
  • Level:
    Undergraduate
  • Page:
    2
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    784

The far reaching hands of McDonaldization

Mcdonaldization has been defined as the operation by which the concepts of the fast food business are continually and increasingly taking a commanding influence over many sectors of the United States’ social setting and the economy and extending to the rest of the world [ CITATION Geo04 l 1033 ]. One of the concepts that Mcdonaldization has brought about is efficiency, not just by convincing many families that it is convenient and the best way of planning time and money is by not eating at home but ordering fast food via phone or the internet or eating out in restaurants, but also the concepts have brought in the idea of efficiency in every other sector of the economy, meaning that what needs to be achieved must be realized even if it means at the cost of quality and service. The concept of delivery to the doorsteps was promoted and popularized by McDonald’s, this has been copied even in the delivery of services in the sector of education.

Just like the rest of the sectors of the American society, and indeed the rest of the world, the education sector has not been immune from the effects of McDonaldization. In modern learning, the tutor or lecturer does not in many cases direct, conduct personalized tuition or assess the students differently in their schools according to their abilities, instead, they are given group assignments after selecting preferred topics, and they are assessed as a team as opposed to individuals. This leaves the students to take ownership of their work deliver to their teachers for discussion as groups. This can easily be compared to the concept of McDonald’s where a customer places an order, pays, picks the order from the serving counter, clears their own table and even discards the packaging materials on their own. Just like McDonald’s, who only prepares the food, the tutor only facilitates the lesson [ CITATION Hed15 l 1033 ]. The concept of efficiency clearly comes out, not taking into consideration of the individual needs of the leaners.

The introduction and subsequent adoption of e-learning in almost all universities in the world, where curriculum and the course outline for a specific course of a term or semester is sent to all students in the program, who then will download the content, do their assignments, send them for marking and comments and even do their examinations online, which is then assessed by the course tutor and grades or results posted in a portal has seen an increase in numbers of students who take such mode of learning. This ensures the reduction of cost by universities by well utilization of resources, in this case using one platform and one tutor to reach masses of students in different locations. This can also be compared to the concept of McDonald’s where the establishment uses its customers, without pay to own ordering, paying, clearing the table and even disposing the used packaging material. The ‘drive thru’ strategy further brings clearly the concept of efficiency by ensuring that those who ordinarily would not leave their cars to go and have a meal, they can be served from the comfort of their cars. This is exactly the same idea with e-learning or open learning as it is referred in other countries. The learner can access material and do all that is required from the comfort of their homes and not necessarily visiting a lecture like in the past [ CITATION Hed15 l 1033 ]

analysis of issues or growing into becoming ethically responsible citizens. The Khan Academy has been compared with the ready to order products by McDonald’s where the consumer does not need to wait for a quality and nutritious meal to be prepared at home, but can have it anywhere and anytime even at school. Education at this point is considered more as a product than a wholistic approach in imparting new ideas and growing them on a daily basis with the intention of making the child a better citizen. reduces the interaction between learners and their teachers. It is all about the grades the learner scores and generally how well the idea works, it is not about training the children to be independent thinkers, creative, in-depth [ CITATION Wri14 l 1033 ]The introduction of Khan Academy for example means that teachers are slowly being substituted by the use of videos by those schools practicing this mode of teaching. This, as argued by

References

Najafi, H. (2015). McDonaldization, Society, and Education. International Journal of Humanities and Social Science , 211-214.

Ritzer, G. (2004). The McDonaldization of Society. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications.

Wright, S. (2014, August 16). Wright’sRoom. Retrieved from shelleywright.wordpress.com: https://shelleywright.wordpress.com/2014/08/16/the-mcdonaldization-of-education-the-rise-of-slow/