This essay is a brief analysis of some of the issues involved in the decision to replace school employees with professional service providers. It consists of an introduction, a brief overview of the issues, three specific issues of consideration, and a conclusion with recommendations to employ best practices in making the choice and implementing it.
Non-Instructional Services in Schools
Replacing non-instructional personnel in schools with professional service providers is a controversial topic for several reasons. Parents and other stakeholders are naturally more reluctant to trust the welfare of their children to for-profit professional service providers than local school employees. Whereas schools have direct control over their employees, outsourced workers are more loyal to their employers than to schools. There are concerns about the quality of services and how their quality might be adversely affected by cost-cutting measures. On the other hand, outsourcing non-essential functions could potentially represent significant cost savings for educational institutions. On balance, outsourcing non-instructional functions is a viable approach to cost reduction provided that institutions follow best practices in connection with selection of service providers and accurate calculation of measurable projected outcomes. However, in addition to the actual implementation of an effective service selection process, there are also internal political considerations.
Overview of Issues
The cost of education in America has been continually increasing for decades, particularly at the college level, so much so that hundreds of colleges have cut departments and services and reduced options available to students as cost-cutting measures (Bushman & Dean, 2005). Outsourcing non-instructional or non-mission-critical functions can often reduce costs and improve services. However, where it is not properly researched and implemented, it can actually cost more than retaining institutional employees in those positions (Maciejewski, 2007). Whether the changeover to professional services increases or decreases the quality of services is an important concern, as is the identification of processes to ensure the former and prevent the latter from occurring.
Outsourcing May Reduce the Cost of Maintaining Education Programs
Generally, professional service providers can furnish the same types of food vendor and janitorial services (etc.) for lower costs than the comparable cost of directly employing the staff necessary to furnish the same services, mainly by virtue of economy of scale and the efficiency of processes associated with large operations dedicated to specific kinds of services (Bushman & Dean, 2005; Weaver Smith & Smith, 2012). Large operations can maintain the same services at such lower overhead costs that they can typically offer highly competitive prices even after accounting for a healthy profit (Bushman & Dean, 2005; Weaver Smith & Smith, 2012).
The Quality of Services May Decrease
Possibly the most common concern among decision-makers in connection with the outsourcing of non-instructional services is that it may be difficult to ensure the same quality of services without direct control of those operations (Maciejewski, 2007). Quite obviously, that lack of control could allow service providers to cut corners or to make other decisions that result in diminution of the quality of services received by the educational institutions and with significantly less leverage to order improvements than in situations where the same service are provided by employees (Weaver Smith & Smith, 2012).
The Prospect of Success Depends Substantially on the Process of Service Selection
There are internal political dynamics that can undermine the effort to implement outsourcing programs. Therefore, it is essential that the introduction of the concept be promoted with comprehensive efforts to achieve "buy-in" among all of the principal stakeholders, at least as a conceptual approach to solving problems recognized by all of them (Bushman & Dean, 2005). According to the available literature, there is a consensus that replacing non-instructional staff or non-mission-critical staff with outsourced professional service providers can greatly increase the prospect for success in reducing costs provided that the educational institution employs several rules or best practices (Bushman & Dean, 2005; Maciejewski, 2007; Weaver Smith & Smith, 2012).
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