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Opinions of Higher Education Students about Internships and Working while Studying
286-297Views:323The importance of working while studying in higher education has a globally growing tendency, and Hungary is not an exception. The demand for the opportunities of student employment has been recognized not only by the students but also by the policy makers of higher education, leading to the introduction of solutions like the obligatory internship semesters or the dual training programs. The current study contributes to the better understanding of this field through the analysis of a database from a questionnaire survey conducted among bachelor students from seven majors of the University of Debrecen during the Fall semester in 2015 (N = 589). The main findings suggest that the students mostly consider the internships as an investment into their future career while the short term compensation and the personal interests have a lower importance for them. About 75% of the students would be willing to work not more than 20 hours a week, and most of them would look for ‘official’ studentwork. For working, they would sacrifice the time connected to the following activity-areas (relative to the other activities in the list, and in descending order): time for leisure (this is the most likely to be sacrificed), for sport, for friends, for family, and for learning (this is the less likely to be traded in for working hours). Willingness to work (measured in daily working hours) seems to be connected to the following factors: major, year of study, how important the activity areas are considered compared to working (learning, family, friends, sports, leisure), and the importance of finding a personally interesting internship.
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Markmyprofessor: the More the Better?
232-243Views:1192Student evaluation of faculty members is a current topic both internationally and in Hungary, partly due to the massification and partly due to the marketization of higher education. One of the evaluation methods is the internet-based voluntary rating which was started by ratemyprofessors.com in the U.S.A. and whose Hungarian counterpart is markmyprofessor.com. Research studies on the U.S. website – among many other critics – established that reliability of this evaluation method highly depends on the frequency of ratings: if an individual tutor is evaluated by more students, then the standard deviation of the ratings is smaller. The previous conclusion about the U.S. website is tested in our study based on Hungarian data. Our main result is that many of the experiences about markmyprofessor.com echo the previous findings about ratemyprofessors.com. Beside this in the Hungarian sample the higher response rate is associated with lower average ratings.
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Testing the Sametest-effect in a BSc-level Business Communication Course Examination
10-15Views:56Using secondary data, we empirically examine two biasing effects that may arise in the written evaluation of large groups of students. Suppose the students take the examination in consecutive groups, and we wish to avoid the distortion caused by tests of different difficulty. In that case, we can decide to use the same examination questions. However, the danger of the "same test effect" arises, according to which the group writing later can perform better if it receives information from the examinees in the previous round. Using the same examination tests cannot be recommended if that effect is significant. Another related potential phenomenon is the "revealed sameness effect". Accordingly, if the examinees are aware of the repetition of the questions, it significantly increases the scores of the following group. We tested these phenomena using the data of a three-round written examination. A previously published analysis of a larger sample found that the "same test effect" can be expected if the students decide in which round they take the examination. Since it was possible to freely register for the examination rounds for the assessment analyzed in this study, we assume that the "same test effect" will be significant. Based on the literature, we also expected that the "revealed sameness effect" would occur in the third round. The performed linear regression analysis (N=77) only found some weak evidence for the 'revealed sameness effect' but not for the 'same test effect'.
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Examining Organisational Culture with OCAI among Technical Management BSc Students of the University of Debrecen
1-8Views:306Based on the OCAI model, our study analyses and compares two things (1) the corporate culture of the University of Debrecen Faculty of Engineering as it is perceived by its engineering management students; and (2) the culture they think would be ideal. According to the respondents the existing culture is closer to the clan type and further from the market type compared to the average. Their ideal culture is closer to the clan, adhocracy and further from the market (compared to the average). The perceived current and the ideal culture are significantly different only in the adhocracy type. From the 20 items of the OCAI questionnaire 7 were significantly different from the average in the case of the perceived culture and 13 in the case of the ideal culture. Differences between ideal and present cultures are statistically supported only in the following dimensions: dominant characteristics (clan is currently stronger, adhocracy is weaker), corporate leadership (market is currently stronger), strategic emphasis (hierarchy is currently stronger).
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The Dunning–Kruger Effect in Knowledge Management Examination of BSc Level Business Students
14-21Views:161The Dunning-Kruger effect (DKE) in higher education evaluation is one of the current research areas of psychology, educational science, and management science (in our case). Its importance is that the less prepared one is, the less accurately one can judge what performance is expected of him. What is more, he will err more and will overestimate himself. The present study aims better to understand the phenomenon with new, small-sample empirical results. The study is part of a research series that has been ongoing at the University of Debrecen since 2015. It not only quantitatively expands the literature but also includes the course of Knowledge Management among those examined. During the research, students were asked both before the examination (N = 63) and after the examination (N = 76) to guess how many points they would achieve on a multiple-choice test. It supports the presence of DKE, both in the case of pre-examination and post-examination self-evaluations. Using four multivariate linear regression models, we examined whether the sign value or absolute value of the errors made during the guesses show a correlation - in addition to the available control variables - with the test score. Our results showed that the more accurate the pre-examination and post-examination estimations were, the higher the students' actual score was, while the less they tended to overestimate their preparation. This supports the presence of DKE, both in the case of pre-exam and post-exam self-evaluation.
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Organisational Culure and Academic Performance of Technical Management BSc Students
1-11Views:128Our study analyses the connection between perceived and ideal organizational cultures and academic results. A modified, self-managed OCAI questionnaire was used to measure perceived and ideal organizational cultures among engineering management students of the University of Debrecen Faculty of Engineering (N = 114). Our results reveal weak positive linear correlations between academic performance and perceived or ideal level of clan culture. In case of other culture types we did not find any consistent relationship. Based on our results students who consider clan culture ideal can expect better results than those who prefer other types. Among students who visit at least 61% of the classes those who reported fitting (or better fitting) perceived and ideal cultures tend to perform better in their studies.
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What Image is Conveyed by the Webpages of Hungarian Higher Education Institutions?
355-370Views:89This exploratory study analyses the online higher education marketing practice in Hungary. It examines the homepages of all of the state accredited higher education institutions in Hungary. The selected dimensions of the examination are to measure different aspects of openness expressed by the image published on the homepages to their audience. State vs. non-state financed (and as a sub-category of the latter: church financed) institutions are compared along these dimensions, as well as universities vs. colleges (according to their status both before 2000 and present). The main finding of the research is that there is a statistically significant evidence that the homepages expressed different images for the analysed institution groups. Differentiating signals between state financed institutions vs. non-state financed institutions, as well as between universities vs. colleges were identified: the number of pictures published on the main page, the presence of sliders, the accessibility of the website to people with visual impairment and to non-Hungarian speakers, and the access to social media. State institutions and universities were found to publish a more open image via their homepages than the non-state financed institutions and the colleges.
