EDUCATIONAL VALUE CHAINS AS SPRING BOARD FOR SUSTAINABLE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

Babalola Taiwo

Department of General Studies

Moshood Abiola Polytechnic Abeokuta.

Email: babalolataiwo33@yahoo.com

ABSTRACT

Today, the universities as higher education institutes are faced with a changing environment. Increasing international competition besides changing management paradigms in higher education, make universities encounter with new challenges. So knowing factors which improve management methods and create competitive advantage is very important. This study review researches on value chain in higher education and related fields. Some of these researches applied the basic Porters value chain model in explaining part of the activities. But some of them believe that the Porters model is designed specifically for business enterprises not social services organizations, and higher education as a service sector needs a specific value chain model which can explain process and components of value adding in this sector. This study recommends that the institutions of higher learning should try to implement these models in their own way and analyse the gaps in the value chain in order to improve on it. It is also recommended that researcher can use various methods to explore the value chain components. They can apply qualitative research methodologies which less used in recent researches. As well they can take advantages of quantitative research methods to describe this concept experimentally and fundamentally. This work comprises of introduction, history and development of value chain, conceptual issue, brief literature review, service value chain in higher education and conclusion and recommendation.