Assessing student satisfaction in transnational higher education

Abstract

Given that there exists in the literature relatively little research into student experiences in transnational higher education, this study seeks to identify the determinants of student satisfaction at international branch campuses in the United Arab Emirates (UAE). This quantitative study involved 247 undergraduate and postgraduate students at branch campuses in the UAE who completed a questionnaire using either hard copies or an online version. It was found that levels of student satisfaction at UAE branch campuses were generally high. The factors that were most influential in determining whether or not a student at a UAE branch campus was satisfied overall with their institution were quality of lecturers, quality and availability of resources, and effective use of technology. The findings indicate that there remains scope for UAE branch campuses to further increase levels of student satisfaction. Managers might use the findings to review their own institution's performance so that areas for improvement can be identified. Given that cultures, customs, traditions and social contexts vary considerably in different locations, the findings of this study are not generalisable across all international branch campuses globally. The logit model developed had an 87.4% success rate in predicting whether or not a student at a UAE branch campus was satisfied overall with their institution, demonstrating the potential usefulness of logistic regression as a predictive and explanatory tool in education management.

Decoding Student Satisfaction: How to Manage and Improve the Laboratory Experience

“…Competition between universities to attract quality students has intensified as institutions try to grow domestically and internationally [3], [27]. This competitive environment has resulted in students having a greater variety of institutions to select from.…”

Developing a measure for student perspectives on institutional effectiveness in higher education

“…quality of learning outcomes, quality of advising, quality of administrative and technical support) and process (i.e. the efficiency of administrative and technical operations as well as the school climate) of the learning environment (Maddox & Nicholson, 2014;Wilkins & Balakrishnan, 2013).…”

Assessing Postgraduate Students’ Satisfaction with Quality of Services at a Turkish University Using Alternate Ordered Response Models

“…M. Hill, 1995;Y. Hill et al, 2003;Mai, 2005;Negricea et al, 2014;Ravindran and Kalpana, 2012;Roman, 2014;Sakthivel et al, 2005;Wang and Tseng, 2011;Wilkins et al, 2013; were also found to significantly affect student satisfaction with quality of higher education services. Similarly, many earlier studies (de Kleijn et al, 2012;Harman, 2003;Khosravi et al, 2013;Munteanu et al, 2010;Sutton and Sankar, 2011;Zhao et al, 2007) underlined the importance of academic advising services on student satisfaction.…”

“…However, education is no longer limited to high school and college experiences since more and more students undertake graduate courses (Wang and Tseng, 2011). Indeed, a number of studies (Arambewela and Hall, 2008;Barnes and Randall, 2012;de Kleijn et al, 2012;Harman, 2003;Sutton and Sankar, 2011;Uysal, 2015;Wilkins and Stephens Balakrishnan, 2013;Zhao et al, 2007) have successfully concentrated on postgraduate students' expectations and satisfaction. Nevertheless, further research is periodically needed to better understand postgraduate students' level of satisfaction and which indicators contribute to their satisfaction levels for improving the quality of higher education services.…”

“…Similarly, many earlier studies (de Kleijn et al, 2012;Harman, 2003;Khosravi et al, 2013;Munteanu et al, 2010;Sutton and Sankar, 2011;Zhao et al, 2007) underlined the importance of academic advising services on student satisfaction. Among others, the significant impact of graduate school (Ravindran and Kalpana, 2012;Uysal, 2015), learning resources, use of technology and physical facilities (Arambewela and Hall, 2008;Demaris and Kritsonis, 2008;Munteanu et al, 2010;Petruzzellis et al, 2006;Ravindran and Kalpana, 2012;Wilkins et al, 2013;Yang, Becerik-Gerber, & Mino, 2013), course and program effectiveness (Denson et al, 2010;Guo, 2010;Harman, 2003;F. M. Hill, 1995;Marzo Navarro et al, 2005;Montanari and Viroli, 2010;Munteanu et al, 2010;Wilkins et al, 2012), tuition fee (Clemes et al, 2008), university image (Alves and Raposo, 2007;Arambewela and Hall, 2008;Azoury et al, 2014;Brown and Mazzarol, 2009;Clemes et al, 2008;Helgesen and Nesset, 2007), year of study (Clemes et al, 2008;Oldfield and Baron, 2000), student loyalty and retention (Brown and Mazzarol, 2009;DeShields Jr et al, 2005;Elliott and Healy, 2001;Gibson, 2010;Giner and Rillo, 2015...…”