Quality of University Service and Student Satisfaction: From Chinese College Student Perception

• In Event: Student admissions and learning in higher education

Proposal

Purpose of the Study
Connotative development refers to the purpose of strengthening the cultivation of talents and improving the cultivation environment for talents at the micro level (Dunrong Bie,2018). It is evident that improving the quality of university services is a crucial part of the connotative development of higher education. Therefore, This study explores evaluation methods and improvement strategies of university service quality.
Literature Review and Theoretical Framework
The literature review shows that the research on student campus satisfaction is mainly divided into two categories: first is the quantitative study on campus satisfaction evaluation. The SERVQUAL principle and evaluation model are more applicable evaluation models (HE,2012; Yu,2010). The second type of student satisfaction research is the case study of universities in different regions, different types, and different levels (Ayodeji Emmanuel Oke and Others，2017; Raza Ali Tunio and Others,2017; Matilde Bini1 • Lucio Masserini ,2016).
This study uses SERVQUAL (Parasuraman et al.,1988) model and its principles as a theoretical analysis framework. The core of its theory is the “quality of service gap model”, that is, the quality of service depends on the degree of difference between the level of service perceived by the user and the level of service expected by the user. With SERVQUAL, service providers can get an indication of the quality of the service offering and highlight areas that need improvement.
Methods
According to the SERVQUAL model framework, this study surveyed the student perceptions, and randomly interviewed 100 students’ to collect data on their thoughts on campus services in a comprehensive university in northeastern China. 81 campus service perception points were selected as indicators. The quality of indicators was analyzed by using Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) (Munasinghe DS and Others,2017; Saracoglu, B.O.,2013).
The basic procedures for building a hierarchical model include: (1) Establishing an indicator hierarchy structure diagram, (2) Construction judgment matrix, (3) Relative importance calculation, (4) Consistency test, (5) Comprehensive importance analysis.
Data Collection and Analysis
A multilevel survey design was used in this study. The questionnaire was divided into two parts. The first part is the basic information such as the gender, grade, and students’ subject major in the university. The second part included the description of four types of activities and situations in the university service; this included 14 questions on campus environment, 16 questions on teaching quality, and 36 questions on campus resources, 15 questions on administrative resources, total of 81 questions. The scoring method of this study used the Likert five-point scale to assess the quality of university services based on the real feelings of students. The scores are 5, 4, 3, 2, and 1 respectively, which means the higher the score, the more satisfied the students are. The reliability of the questionnaire was 0.962, the validity was between 0.698 and 0.984, which were within the acceptable range.
A total of 9856 valid questionnaires were collected in a comprehensive university in North-Eastern China. Multilevel Hierarchical Model is used to process the data, considering the nested nature of the data.
Findings
1. Overall satisfaction on campus:
It can be seen from the data that students have been extremely satisfied. The integral satisfaction rate is 4.03. In addition, the teaching quality scored (4.24), highest among samples. Then they refer to administrative resources (4.01), campus resources (3.99), and the campus environment (3.87) respectively.
2. Satisfaction on campus environment:
Students’degree of satisfaction were at different levels on campus environment. The highest is that the school pays additional attention towards minority students (minorities, international students)” (4.23), the second is the campus beautification (4.18), the conducive living conditions around university(4.03) campus. The lowest indicator was the university toilet (3.23).
3. Satisfaction on teaching quality:
In terms of teaching quality, students have the highest recognition of the teacher's professional ability (4.34), followed by the university's teaching idea (4.32), teachers’ learning experience (4.32), and the teachers’ professional assistance (4.32). The three lowest indicators of student satisfaction are: foreign language learning opportunities (3.98), curriculum diversity and integration (4.14), and curriculum practicality (4.19).
4. Satisfaction on campus resource:
The top three indicators for students' highest satisfaction with campus resources are: student loans (4.19), campus logo (4.16), and library environment (4.15). The three minimum indicators are: accommodation (3.59), welfare (3.74), and drinking water quality (3.85). The university's campus cultural life (4.13), elective system (4.09), catering service (4.09), fee management (4.05) and other indicators, which are higher for students.
5. Satisfaction on administrative resources:
The top three indicators for students' satisfaction with university administrative resources are: scholarship (4.13), university website (4.12), and university administrative measures (4.07). Students have the lowest satisfaction with university administrative resources which are: student feedback (3.93), administrative efficiency (3.93), and university timeliness (3.95).
Implications
1.Teaching and curriculum construction:
(1) Strengthen the diversity and integration of course content（Jiayu Zhang，2000）, It is strongly recommended to open a language and art generalization courses and a two-semester advanced mathematics course and at least one semester of information technology courses.
(2) The teaching content and curriculum design should be closely integrated with the needs of the society, and aim at the development of the students' future career. Teachers must continue to learn and understand the development of the industry. Universities can also directly introduce industry experts to integrate students' learning.
(3) The teacher's instructional design should reflect integration. Teachers should actively use emerging modern educational technologies and necessary teaching techniques ,such as MOOC, mixed learning, flipping classrooms, deep learning, virtual reality, discussion or activity teaching methods etc.
2. Campus resource service:
(1) University Campus should provide improved facilities and services for students’ convenience on campus, in order to give students a better experience during their stay in the university.
(2) Administrative service efficiency should be greatly improved. Students are not satisfied with the quality of service provided by the administrators.
(3) Sports facilities and activities should be improved for students to experience extracurricular activities fully.

Authors

• Lili Wang, School of Educational Science ,Harbin,Normal University,CHINA

• Wenfan Yan, University of Massachusetts Boston