ACADEMIC QUALITY CHARACTERISTICS AND SATISFACTION: A EMPIRICAL SURVEY AMONG THE STUDENTS OF TWO MALAYSIAN PRIVATE UNIVERSITIES

In response to the market needs and demands, the private higher education in Malaysia has undergone extensive changes in the recent years to the extent that it has been regarded as supplementing and complementing the public higher education system. In view of that, higher education in Malaysia has become a business and burgeoning market for earning revenues. As such, quality has always been a concern to be addressed in higher education reforms in Malaysia and in most countries. The main objectives of this study were to investigate the students’ level of satisfaction in academic quality in their current university and the academic quality characteristics which were important to them. Two Malaysian private universities were selected for study and participants were 768 undergraduate students from the bachelor and pre-tertiary levels from a wide range of disciplines. Student satisfaction in the quality of higher education, in four specific areas namely academic programme, lecturers, academic services and facilities are presented and the academic quality characteristics in each of these areas which were perceived as important to the students are also revealed.