The Study of the Effective Factors in Formation and Development of Malfunctioning in Iran’s Higher Education

Document Type : Scientific - Research

Authors

1 PhD student in Educational Management at Kharazmi University

2 Professor, Department of Educational Management, Faculty of Management, Kharazmi University

3 Associate Professor, Department of Educational Management, Faculty of Management, Kharazmi University

Abstract

Previous studies have claimed that Iran’s higher education sector has failed to fulfill its intended functions effectively leading to a malfunctioning. The present study, therefore, makes an attempt to investigate the factors and dimensions of this malfunctioning in education through a qualitative content analysis. The research population is composed of all the professors and post graduate students in Iran’s state universities. Sampling, similar to most sampling types in qualitative studies, is a purposive one. It was done through a criterion and network sampling strategies. The number of informants, based on the principle of saturation in qualitative studies, is 28 who come from diverse universities and institutes including Kharazmi University, ShaheedBeheshti University, Tehran University, Tarbiyat-e Modarres University, Shareef Technical University, Tabriz University, Mashhad University and The Institute of Research and Planning for Higher Education. Unstructured interviews were employed to gather the data, which subsequently were analyzed in several stages using the thematic analysis method. The validity of the analyses was ensured by peer audit and peer debriefing. Results indicated that the instances of higher education malfunctioning can be categorized into 10 major groups which include 36 sub-categories.

Keywords


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