PurposeThe purpose of the paper is to ascertain students' perceptions on quality of services provided by private universities in Thailand and Japan and how these affected decisions selecting a university. A comparative study aims to focus on how cultural and economic factors affected their decisions.Design/methodology/approachResearch design sought students' perceptions through empirical surveys on the type of factors which influenced their decisions in selecting a university. As the students needed to form their views on personal experience on services categorized into ten factors, the research sample included students with one‐four years of campus experience. The research instrument was a well validated questionnaire developed on a review of literature and a pilot study. For the main study, 1,900 Thai students from nine private universities and 703 Japanese students from two private colleges were invited to participate.FindingsFindings suggest that in selecting a university campus the university's reputation, academic staff, quality of the programs and job‐placement were the most important factors that influenced student decisions. The comparative analyses reveal many similarities and some differences between the two groups while Thai students had a higher degree of satisfaction than Japanese counterparts which may perhaps be attributed to economic disparities.ImplicationsFindings may not be generally applicable as the sample was limited and cultural contexts were somewhat similar. Yet, there were generic factors applicable to most universities.Originality/valueThese findings are valuable to university administrators and academics to improve the quality of services which are most important in influencing student perceptions in selecting a university.

School-based management (SBM) in Thailand began in 1997 in the course of a reform aimed at overcoming a profound crisis in the education system. The present contribution reports on the introduction and institutionalisation of decentralisation and SBM with community participation in Thailand. The data reported here are based on an empirical survey of 1,000 school-board members from Bangkok as well as provincial and rural areas which was followed by 45 interviews with all relevant stakeholders. The results of the study are promising, as they show broad support for the reform among school principals as well as board members. However, they also reveal a continuing need to train principals and board members in educational leadership and management.

Purpose -This paper aims to focus on a study of the effectiveness of head teacher leadership within TAFE NSW. Design/methodology/approach -Quantitative and qualitative methods were employed to identify and measure the effective leadership attributes of the head teachers. The research sample consisted of head teachers and teachers. Findings -The results suggest that the effectiveness of head teachers' leadership needs to be improved substantially. More specifically, there was a significant difference between the self-perceived leadership effectiveness of the head teachers and the leadership effectiveness perceived by the teachers. The study also showed that the effects of gender, length of service as a head teacher, length of service in the position and the educational discipline area did not have a substantial effect on head teacher leadership effectiveness. However, emergent issues such as workload, lack of support and training, and the gap between the head teacher and higher-level management were significant factors affecting head teacher leadership. Practical implications -The findings suggest leadership development programs should be initiated to assist in developing the leadership areas in need of improvement, and additionally the need for better succession planning of the organization. Originality/value -A study of the nature and scale, focused on the head teacher leadership effectiveness has not been undertaken before, within the Australian context, and this paper presents some useful information for future workforce planning of VET institutions and significant addition to the existing stock of knowledge.

The final decade of the twentieth century saw a major shift to self‐governance for schools in many countries, including the UK and Australia. This trend is underpinned by the assumption that greater autonomy will lead to improved educational outcomes. The impact of self‐management on principals and schools is now well documented but much less attention has been given to the implications for governance, a significant omission as the process of decentralisation transfers responsibilities to governing bodies rather than school principals. Reviews the main issues of governance and illustrates them from the research in England and Wales and in Australia. It joins the debate about the appropriate balance between governance and management for governing bodies and examines the lay/professional interface in school governance. It assesses governors’ role as representatives of school interest groups and concludes by setting out a research agenda for governance in self‐managing schools.

IntroductionIn the contemporary world, school-based management (SBM) with devolution of authority is becoming a common phenomenon. It is a more progressive democratic step in the centralization vs decentralization continuum. The research has revealed SBM as a pragmatic approach to a formal alteration of the bureaucratic model of school administration with a more democratic structure. This form of decentralization identifies the individual school as the primary unit of improvement and relies on the redistribution of decisionmaking authority through which improvements in the schools are stimulated and sustained. It is believed that democratic devolution leads to more effective decision making resulting in increased autonomy, flexibility, productivity, and accountability.However, SBM is a concept which has not been adequately researched to prove its effectiveness. Malen et al. [1] stated that the resurgence of SBM provides opportunities to research this movement in a variety of settings and under diverse conditions to generate the knowledge-base needed to discover whether SBM operates as a significant strategy that realizes its stated goals and improves the performance of schools. Chapman[2] emphasized that the Victorian initiative is of particular interest to those concerned about school effectiveness as it sought school improvement through a wide-ranging community and staff involvement and a revised role for principals, while Brown[3] emphasized that the Victorian example of SBM in its form of political decentralization would be most worthy of further study. It was against this background that this research project was undertaken in 1992-93, involving 66 state schools for the purpose of ascertaining the overall effectiveness of the Victorian model of SBM. The article includes brief discussions on the evolution of democratic devolution; previous research, the purpose, methodology and the sample of this project, analysis of data and some of the findings of the research.