Intelligent Management in Higher Education

In recent editorial sections of the Journal of Medical Education (JME), in two articles by Afshar entitled ”The role of private sector in higher education: from quantity and quality ...”, (1) and Enjoo entitled “Money, Power, Justice and Higher Education” (2), have mentioned their concerns, about the article published in this Journal entitled “  Encouraging Factors for Invest in Higher Education … “ (3). Herein, some of the points on their comments are explained: In the case of Private sector investment, Afshar has focused on the attitude of investors in higher education, and believes that the private sector does not pay attention to the issue of justice and easy access to higher education, especially for low-income citizens. She basically believes that it is difficult to create a balance between the national development goals and the justice standards which the government is following and the goals pursued by the private sector. Enjoo by mentioning “… a special chance to achieve scientific power by the power of their parents…” implies the formation of educational inequality between university applicants from rich families, and the same applicants, who belong to poor families. In scientific literature, there are three major models for the finance provision and allocation in higher education (4). The disadvantages of “market-based” model that has been mentioned as “privatization” is a lack of central oversight over supply money and method of its spending on higher education. Basically, this model is applicable to higher education in free market conditions. Moreover, the imbalance in the return of social and private capital is one of the existing concerns. But in another model, called “quotas”, higher education is allowed to maintain personal and social benefits of higher education. In addition, in this model, the provision of  governmentsponsored training not only emphasizes the maintenance of financial resources, but the price of training courses is reduced, which is beneficial for poorer students. Studies have also introduced four types of organizational management (5). These organizational management types – in terms of management, controls, earnings, accountability, social functions, etc. – can be set on a spectrum. One side of the spectrum is the “budget organization” and the other one is the “private organization”. Having directing managerial approach to higher education, from the budget side to the other side of the spectrum, in addition to preserving the state ownership of universities, it is possible to achieve social goals, including quality and justice. On the other hand, by giving more autonomy to managers, their motivation to attract private sector funding is encouraged, and opportunities for maintaining and using surplus revenues are provided to them. In this case, a competition of quality is formed between higher education institutions. Finally, we focus readers’ attention on this important point that Privatization in higher education is not a two-dimensional concept, and management practices in higher education cannot be turned into purely private management and defined against purely government management, instead, some intermediate cases could explain the concept of privatization in higher education. For example, Participation of public universities with private sector in the provision of educational services or expansion of educational knowledge-based institutions affiliated with state universities. In these two approaches of management, the state’s presence in order to cover the national interests and the social consequences of educational equity is imperative. It must be accepted that changes in the managerial model of higher education is extremely time consuming and can be implemented slowly and gradually. Articles on private sector partnership in higher education are being developed which will be gradually published in future issues of this journal, and can be criticized by readers.