Assessing Quality in Higher Education: New Criteria for Evaluating Students' Satisfaction

Abstract

The aim of this research is to present a new quality assurance model (5Qs) and to examine the major factors affecting students' perception of cumulative satisfaction. The model includes behavioural dimensions of student satisfaction. The factors included in this cumulative summation are technical functional infrastructure interaction and atmosphere of higher education institutions. This study concerns students in higher education institutions in Istanbul Turkey. The questionnaire contains a total of 39 items (attributes) of newly developed five quality dimensions (5Qs). A total of 1641 complete and usable questionnaires was received. Frequency analysis factor analysis and reliability analysis were used for analysing the data collected. Inspection of scree plot and eigenvalues enabled the analysis to reduce the 39 quality attributes to seven factors. The results can be used by higher education institutions to re-engineer and re-design creatively their quality-management processes and the future direction of their more effective education quality strategies. © 2011 Taylor & Francis.