This study investigates efficiency differences among
high schools in Niğde province of Turkey assuming both constant returns
and increasing returns technology in empirical educational production
function. The analysis was based on Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) using
linear programming. In addition, to determine whether outliers affects
efficiency scores, the Jackknifing method and Spearman rank correlation
coefficients were employed. The evidence provided by both of the tests
showed that the DEA results are consistent. The results obtained from
the DEA analysis imply that all the schools subject to the analysis appear
to have had adequate resources, if fully utilized. When the constant (variable)
returns technology is employed, the total inefficiency is about 38 (31%)
and out of the 35 schools, about 89 (74%) were found to be inefficient.
The results that the number of efficient schools has increased when variable
returns technology is assumed imply that scale economies are important
in education and the use of increasing returns technology in education
production function is more appropriate. PDFFulltextXMLReferencesCitation
How to cite this article
A. Ergulen and I. Torun, 2009. Efficiency Differences Across High Schools in Niğde, Province of Turkey. Journal of Applied Sciences, 9: 1733-1739.