چکیده:
Developing appropriate scientific-technical tools for analyzing, explaining, and evaluating the decisions, activities, and performance of higher education units at various levels has always been raised as a fundamental issue; the aim of this research was to explore and represent the various basic applications of the production function in analyzing the activities and outputs of higher education, along with identifying the issues and challenges ahead. Using a descriptive-analytical method within a holistic approach, first, the mission and nature of higher education activities were described, emphasizing their processes and outcomes at micro and macro levels. Then, eleven strategic applications of the production function within the framework of producer theory were identified and explained, including: specifying the rational or economic region of activity, predicting production outputs, evaluating the impact and share of each production factor in the outputs, evaluating the technical efficiency of educational units, evaluating the effectiveness of educational units, determining the status of returns to scale, determining the complementarity or substitutability of production factors, analyzing the performance inequality of educational/research units, determining the share paid to the factors of production for educational-research services, evaluating educational policies, and ranking academic units. It was also found that the applications of the production function in higher education face fundamental issues and challenges, including the multi-product nature of higher education outputs, the diversity and plurality of factors affecting outputs, the quality of outputs and the challenges related to measuring them, the absence of prices for educational outputs, the diversity of analysis units and the hierarchical structure of data, the structure of production functions and related issues, estimation methods, endogeneity selection issues, and statistical limitations. Given the nature of the activities and outputs of academic units, ignoring the aforementioned issues and challenges severely affects the accuracy and validity of the production function applications, which play an essential and irreplaceable role in management decisions and policymaking. Finally, ways to overcome the main mentioned issues and challenges and how to maximize the use of the intended applications in decision-making and policymaking are addressed.
خلاصه ماشینی:
van der Wende & Marginson (2007) and Horstschra (2012) have stated that developing competition between units, making the activity environment more dynamic, informing customers and applicants of higher education services [especially families and students], and enhancing efficiency and effectiveness are considered among the most important objectives.
Within the framework of a broad and deep analysis and representation regarding the research background, first, the mission and nature of higher education activities were dissected, and eleven basic applications of the production function within the producer theory framework were identified and explained, including: determining the rational or economic region of activity, predicting production outputs, evaluating the level of impact and the share of each production factor in the outputs, evaluating the technical efficiency of educational units, evaluating the effectiveness of educational units, determining the status of returns to scale, determining whether production factors are complements or substitutes, analyzing the performance inequality of educational/research units, determining the share paid to the production factors of educational-research services, evaluating educational policies, and ranking university units.
Using a deductive-analytical method within a holistic approach framework, first, the mission and nature of higher education activities, emphasizing their processes and outputs at micro and macro levels, were dissected, and then, eleven strategic applications of the production function within the producer theory framework were identified and explained, including: determining the rational or economic zone of activity, forecasting production outputs, evaluating the degree of impact and the share of each production factor in the outputs, evaluating the technical efficiency of educational units, evaluating the effectiveness of educational units, determining the scale of returns status, determining the complementarity or substitutability of production factors, analyzing performance inequality of educational/research units, determining the share paid to the factors of production of educational-research services, evaluating educational policies, and ranking university units.
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