Evaluation of public HEI on teaching, research, and knowledge dissemination by Data Envelopment Analysis

Governmental policies, such as educational ones, require money from taxes to implement them. Therefore, a government must spend its resources in such a way to maximise the benefits. However, to evaluate the Public Higher Education Institutions (P-HEI) is a very complex task since many factors that can be assessed are involved. In this study, we focus on the performance of P-HEI in three activities: teaching, research, and knowledge dissemination. To accomplish this end, we develop a Data Envelopment Analysis Model to evaluate the efficiency of each activity, separately. Using an official database called ExECUM, we compute the efficiency of 40 Mexican P-HEI from year 2008-2016. The funds allocated for the government are an input in our study. According to our results, most P-HEIs are efficient in only one activity, while few are efficient in two activities. Only one P-HEI reached efficiency of 100% in the three models. On the other hand, 37.5% of the P-HEI do not reach 100% efficiency in any model. Our study provides the set of references for each P-HEI and the increments/decrements in the inputs and outputs to increase its efficiency.