Global university rankings influence students' choices and higher education policies throughout the world. When rankers not only evaluate universities but also provide them with consulting, analytics, or advertising services, rankers are vulnerable to conflicts of interest that may potentially distort their rankings. The paper assesses the impact…

Purpose: The implementation and reporting of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) is one of the emerging challenges for higher education institutions (HEIs), but the lack of well-defined reporting structures and topics for this sector makes it difficult to map and evaluate HEI performance in relation to 2030 Agenda. This study aims to assess…

Purpose: Nowadays, universities increasingly consider reputation as a key component for improving quality and rankings. A positive reputation opens doors to added value and diverse opportunities. This paper aims to explore Middle Eastern higher education managers' perceptions of university reputation components. Design/methodology/approach: Given…

Studies of global university rankings often assume that rankings as Anglo-American policy scripts have an increasing influence resulting in a convergence of policies and practices, or that the ideas of rankings continue to diverge into national types. In this article, we take a middle ground by arguing that when an idea of ranking is grounded in a…

Quality of universities is best viewed through the eyes of stakeholders. Yet, in the United Kingdom and elsewhere, rankings conducted by various agencies purport to provide one overall measure of university quality. This article re-examines some of the data used by university rankers. In so doing, it shows that their information can be repackaged…

This study assesses the technical efficiency of higher education institutions in terms of labor market outcomes for recent graduates, employing a comparative analysis of three distinct methodological approaches. Using a sample of recent graduates of Colombian universities who earned their degrees between 2007 and 2011, we estimated the…

Policy discussions related to higher education in sub-Saharan Africa often include concerns related to quality. Rather than being an abstract characteristic, quality of higher education is the result of a series of actions and practices, and yet there is limited research on the practices associated with quality in higher education in Africa. This…

In the context of the internationalization and marketization of higher education, it has become a trend for a nation to build its higher education brand for global competitiveness. This paper analyses what is seen as the urgent need to enhance China's international education strategy and how branding has assisted in this process. Drawing on…

This article contributes to the debate on university organisational actorhood by surveying the drivers of university strategic behaviour and choice. Utilising organisational literature and interviews with senior leaders from three Canadian research-intensive universities, the article elucidates the dynamics underlying universities' behaviours…

This study evaluates the influence of ranking reports on university brands' credibility and perceived differentiation. Signaling theory is applied to link ranking with credibility and perceived differentiation. An experimental approach was used to collect data and to test the hypothesis. Data was collected from 328 participants in the UK regarding…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to compare the sustainability dimensions reported on the websites of public and private universities in Ghana, an emerging economy. Design/methodology/approach: The universities in Ghana were categorized under public and private universities. The top five under each category were chosen (by Edu Rank's…

This paper aims to recognise the transformations in the concept of quality as formulated by Chilean educational policies between 1985 and 1990, at the beginning of the educational privatisation process. Using a conceptual history approach allowed us to analyse the meanings attributed to the concept of quality in the design and implementation of…

While serving as a benchmark of 'world-class' universities, the global university rankings do not include the vast majority of universities. However, "Times Higher Education" developed a Japanese national university ranking table in 2017, which includes approximately 40% of all Japanese universities. This increased coverage of…

Purpose: This research examined the direct and indirect effect of university social responsibility (USR) on student loyalty through the mediation of service quality and university image. Design/methodology/approach: The sample includes 35 students from Universitas Sarjanawiyata Tamansiswa, a private university, and 74 respondents from Universitas…

Currently, the higher education sector can be considered a marketplace, within which university education is considered a marketable service in the literature on higher education management. The analysis of the variables that generate university image has been the subject of numerous studies on higher education institutions (HEIs). The purpose of…