Quality in higher education: what do students in Cambodia perceive?

The role of higher education to produce qualified graduates with high competence for competitive and borderless job markets has become solemnly complicated in the current globalized world. In parallel, the persistent paradox of what constitutes the quality of education has provoked intellectual debates in diverse educational settings – causing ambiguities and intricacies for policy and educational planning directions. In this respect, this paper reports a quantitative study that aims to investigate Cambodian students’ perception of education quality in higher education. This study employed a quantitative approach and adapted a questionnaire consisting of four categories: institution, faculty, administration, and student characteristics from one study (Akareem & Hossain, Journal of Marketing for Higher Education, 22(1), 11–33, 2012). The data were obtained from 427 students who were studying in different majors and academic years at three universities in Phnom Penh. The results display a nuanced perspective on the interpretation of education quality in Cambodia, exhibiting a change from the conventional baggage which appreciates quality as the effective transmission of knowledge and services.