Higher Education Institutions

The importance of entrepreneurship promotion has increased significantly in today's society, especially during periods of crises. This work is based on the responses obtained through a survey conducted on a sample of 305 undergraduates of the University of the Azores, enrolled in different science programs. The aim is to deepen the knowledge of the entrepreneurial propensity of higher education students in the Azores, and in that way the university can stimulate their interest in creating businesses. The main results obtained, using exploratory data analysis (from the univariate to the multivariate), are presented and discussed.

The Internet is developing as a new paradigm known as Internet of
Things (IoT). Through IoT, any everyday thing can be equipped with
devices that have the ability to communicate, monitor and control the
environment around them, influencing many aspects of human life.
The use of the technologies that are part of IoT is growing
exponentially. This process is likely to help promote global economic
growth. IoT is gradually reaching higher education in various ways.
For example, education or training in topics related to IoT, the use of
IoT as a pedagogical tool, the application of IoT technologies in
support of academic administration, as well as the educational
facilities and resources of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs).

The main purpose of this paper is to identify and describe different
current and potential relationships between IoT technologies and
HEIs. The proposed relationships achieving through reflection and
documentary review of international experiences.

RESUMEN
Internet se está desarrollando como un nuevo paradigma conocido como Internet de las Cosas (Internet of Things o IoT). Mediante IoT, cualquier cosa cotidiana puede ser equipada con dispositivos que tienen la capacidad para comunicarse, monitorizar y controlar el ambiente que le rodea, impactando muchos aspectos de la vida del ser humano. El uso de las tecnologías que hacen parte de IoT está creciendo exponencialmente. Este proceso probablemente ayudará a promover el crecimiento económico global. IoT está llegando gradualmente a la educación superior de diversas formas. Por ejemplo, la educación o formación en temas relacionados con IoT, los usos de IoT como herramienta pedagógica, la aplicación de tecnologías IoT como apoyo a la administración académica, así como de las instalaciones y recursos educativos de las Instituciones de Educación Superior (IES). El propósito principal del presente trabajo es identificar y describir diferentes relaciones actuales y potenciales entre las tecnologías IoT y las IES.
Este propósito se logra mediante la reflexión y la revisión documental de experiencias internacionales. Palabras clave: Instituciones de educación superior, internet de las cosas, tecnología educativa, telemática, innovación tecnológica.

The article explores the issues of academic excellence in higher
education to pursue a position in the world class universities. Two
universities in Pakistan have been chosen for the site of this qualitative
study, one which has achieved the status, and the other still aspiring.
The triangulation has been reached by document analysis of the quality
reports submitted by the two universities, semi structured interviews
with the senior and middle management of the universities, deans, and
director for Quality Enhancement Cells, and head of the departments
of the selected universities. The primary data obtained has been
compared and contrasted with the quality characteristics marked by
standards for academic excellence. Research findings inform us that
unawareness of the international quality standards, and its potential
benefits, disinterest of university leadership are the main problems, due
to which Pakistani universities are lagging behind. The study proposes
if proper understanding and meaningfulness is created through quality
professionalism, it would become much easier to pursue quality assurance process to meet international standards. The findings of the
study will be a unique contribution to the body of literature creating a
point of interest to policy makers and quality assurance practitioners of
the developing countries who are concerned about the academic
excellence of Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) to accentuate in the
significant areas which make any university, a world-class university.

The current study investigates university as an entity of organisation to explore their corporate social responsibility (CSR) practices. The unit of analysis in this study focused on employees in one of the research universities in Malaysia, namely Universiti Putra Malaysia (UPM). The purpose of this study is to identify the level of employees’ understanding on CSR practices as well as their perception on selected elements of CSR that prominently practised in university. A quantitative (survey) method and multistage sampling were employed in this study, whereby questionnaires were distributed to 464 UPM staff (academic and non-academic), with only 285 valid respondents. The respondents were selected from Social Science cluster faculties and Science cluster faculties. This study focuses primarily on descriptive statistics. The findings show that respondents have a high level of understanding about CSR and the three (3) specific dimensions, namely human rights, community driven, and labour rights have shown to be the CSR practices that perceived prominent by the UPM staff. Further study to replicate the research in different university context (public or private) in Malaysian to explore more on CSR practices by respective universities was suggested. Future studies also recommended that relationships between CSR, job satisfaction, and corporate reputation need to be carried out in order to see the link between those variables.

Purpose – This paper examines trends in the content of reporting within 135 UK Higher Education Institutions (HEIs). It explores the extent to which Integrated Reporting (IR) content elements, reflecting integrated thinking, are disclosed voluntarily and whether HEI specific features influence the resulting disclosures.
Design/methodology/approach – Existing IR guidelines given by the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) and the adoption of content analysis have provided the opportunity to examine the trend and extent of IR content elements associated in HEI corporate reports. The evidence was obtained from 405 UK HEI annual reports covering the period 2014-2016. 
Findings-The results indicate a significant increase in the number of IR content elements embedded in HEI annual reports. The HEI specific characteristics examined, such as a) the establishment of HEI (before or after 1992), b) adoption of IR framework and c) size of HEI, are all significantly and positively associated with IR content elements disclosure. This paper argues that institutional theory, isomorphism and isopraxism are relevant for explaining the changes in the contents of HEI annual reports. The findings also suggest that universities are beginning to adopt an integrated thinking approach to the reporting of their activities.
Limitations-The study is based on IR content elements only and could be extended to include the fundamental concepts and basic principles of the IR framework.  There are other factors that have a potentially crucial influence on HEI core activities (such as teaching and learning research and internationalisation) which have been omitted from this study.
Practical implications- The findings will allow policymakers to evaluate the extent to which integrated thinking is taking place and influencing the UK HEI sector in the selection and presentation of information. A further implication of the findings is that an appropriate a sector-wide enforcement and compliance body, for instance, the British Universities Finance Directors Group (BUFDG), may consider developing voluntary IR guidance in a clear, consistent, concise and comparable format. Also, it may pursue regulatory support for this guidance. In doing so, it may monitor the compliance and disclosure levels of appropriate IR requirements. Within such a framework, IR could be used to assist HEIs to make more sustainable choices and allow stakeholders to better understand aspects of HEI performance.
Social implications- The research has implications for society within and beyond the unique UK HEI sector. Universities are places of advanced thinking and can lead the way for other sectors by demonstrating the potential of integrated thinking to create a cohesive wide-ranging discourse and create engagement among stakeholder groups. Specifically, IR builds on the strong points of accounting, for instance, robust quantitative evidence collecting, relevance, reliability, materiality, comparability and assurability, to explain the sustainability discourse into a ‘‘language’’ logical to HEIs organisational decision-makers. Consequently, IR may generate better visibility and knowledge of the financial values of exploiting capitals (financial, intellectual, human, manufactured, social, and natural) and offer a multifaceted approach to reassess HEIs organisational performance in various sectors that support the growth of integrated thinking.
Originality/ value- This is the first known study to explore HEI characteristics and link them with the level of voluntary IR content elements disclosed in UK HEIs.

Private higher education institutions (HEIs) have the unique characteristic of being an institution of higher learning and a business entity at the same time. As a business entity, enrollment is the lifeblood of all HEIs that supports all of its other functions. True of any business, attracting customer and retaining them are the most important aspects that determine its profitability. In the case of HEIs, this means convincing prospective students to enroll and upon entering the institution, retain them until graduation. For this reason, it is important to know what drives student's decision to stay or leave the institution. By understanding the different factors affecting students' attrition and retention decision, the university will be able to effectively make strategic adjustments leading to high retention rate among its clientele: the students. Using the marketing research method called Conjoint Analysis, a tool for identifying underlying preference of consumer and the trade-offs they make, the research determined the students' decision making process related to retention and attrition. The research found that quality of education is the most important factor determining retention and attrition among students. Nevertheless, quality of faculty and increase in total fees significantly impacts students' decision to stay or leave a university as well. Communicating and emphasizing the HEI's excellent quality education at every level is the most important strategy that the institution can adopted.

Worldwide, the investment in building maintenance is huge as it represents almost 50% of the total turnover of construction activities. Building maintenance is also categorised as the commonest function listed in facilities management activities. This pilot study explores the current practice of building maintenance management in higher education institutions in Malaysia. Information gathered from semi-structured interviews focuses on different areas of building maintenance practices. The main issue is to identify the user-requirements. The areas of study are to cover the objectives of maintenance departments, maintenance reporting processes, maintenance verification processes and other associated tasks. In addition, this study also looks into the contributions of Information Technology (IT) facilities to maintenance practices. Based on the findings, there will be differences in the maintenance practices among the four universities; empirically, of the 57 elements studied only 30% were similar. Some strengths and weaknesses in the maintenance practices were identified and ways in which IT facilities could help to improve the situation. In the future it is envisioned that good building maintenance practices would be the norm in Malaysia to maximise the benefits that users could expect from their buildings and facilities.

Despite the vital role of paper publication and citation in higher education institutions (HEIs), literature on publication exercises is relatively scarce. There are a number of factors which influence the rate of university publications and citations. Accordingly, with a focus on policy perspectives, this paper discusses publication exercises by addressing the factors that can increase or decrease the rate of publication and citation in HEIs. The investigated zones are divided into two macro and micro levels, in which macro level deals with global policy and micro level is related to local and university policies. The effective factors and their relevant criteria are traced in all the aforementioned policies.