Title: Challenges facing higher education as a service industry in a developing country

Authors: Nirwan Idrus

Addresses: President/Vice-Chancellor's Office, Universiti Tun Abdul Razak, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Abstract: Developments in education generally and higher education in particular cannot afford to be static. The technology explosion had ensured that higher education is not immune to forced development as well. Observations seem to indicate that the inertia preventing change is so great that relatively little change has happened despite the proliferation of Education Reform White Papers and international deliberations over a number of decades already. The question now is how long could higher education continue to resist change without losing its place in society? This paper proposes a |Higher Education Change Cube| to ensure balanced development in higher education and will show how the model is an obvious one for developing countries. In considering the model, this paper also discusses quality assurance in higher education, the disparity between a country|s economic composition and what its higher education is offering and how to address these.

Keywords: higher education change cube; universities; forced development; inertia; change resistance; educational reform; white papers; balanced development; service science management; service science engineering; economics; service industries; service quality management; developing countries; newly industrialised nations.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSEM.2011.037181

International Journal of Services, Economics and Management, 2011 Vol.3 No.1, pp.104 - 121

Published online: 09 May 2015 *

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