A proposal for market-led higher education

A proposal for several distinct but related industries, in principle decentralized:

Classroom rental. Or rather classroom, laboratory, or any other room (and tools) for teaching. A possible business model consists in auctioning classrooms for a definite period of time. So, the first rental company determines the length of terms, be semesters, thirds, quarters, etc. I guess that the auctioning would be directed towards teachers directly. Such aspects as classroom quality, building location, and period length would be a good contested by the firms serving the market, and this good would be separated from other industries such as teaching and certification. They could also, as a byproduct, sell curriculum prospects of registered students to the curriculum companies.

Teaching proper. The teacher would produce content for the courses and pedagogical ways of teaching. He would design syllabi, choose books if any, would arrange exercises as teaching tools, and would choose the number of classes to teach per week. The business model would consist in announcing the course, gain prestige, and charge students which attend the course, although of course class tasting could occur. Alternatively or supplementally, a patron could sponsor fully or partially a chair, so that would-be teachers could compete for that chair (maybe through ways arranged by the sponsor himself). For a new, innovative course or a new teacher, some sort of angel investment or joint venture could be advisable. Indeed, the teaching industry could be split between pure teaching and course design, although the common knowledge required would probably imply at least a moderate vertical integration among these two industries.

Curriculum. Specialized companies would work making research among potential employers of professionals on the one hand and offered courses (and the course design industry) on the other, so as to create a list of courses (a curriculum) ideal for distinct employers. These "curriculum companies" could also analyze which curricula are more demanded in the market, which are fashion and which ones outdated. They could also have statistics of how much students are enrolled under (at least stated) curricula. Employers could pay for the curriculum company to design curricula tailored at different levels for such employers or otherwise to know fashionable or otherwise successful curricula given market demand. They could even know potential supply of such curricula currently and for the foreseeable future. Curriculum companies could also sell advise services to new students so as for these to know the best prospects of curriculum ranked by employability or other variable.

Certification. Besides the mere course attendance, students could buy the service of course-attendance certification. They could also buy the service of course evaluation. This would create a specialized industry of individual course certification as well as of complete curriculum accomplishment.

This decentralization of the different industries which make higher education, would create competition among the different parts of higher education so that the student can get the best of each. It would also create room for innovation (for instance in course or curriculum designing) which, however, if failing, wouldn't attempt against the whole process of higher education. It would also create a closer relation between higher education programs and employers requirements. It would allow for smooth evolution of career curricula. Last but not least, it would allow that compromised professionals could deep and update their higher education as much as they want. Market has proved more effective than central planning in virtually every human activity. Higher education seems to be not the exception.