Higher education system governance: an exploratory study of presidential decision making in the kentucky community and technical college system

Discussion

The review of literature pointed to higher education systems as the dominant form of governance for public higher education, though the variability and complexity of systems presents challenges to understanding them (McGuinness, 2013; NASH, 2015).

The literature on governance of higher education systems and presidential decision making is examined in the following sections as it relates to the findings of this study. In addition, theory outlined by Birnbaum (1988) frames an understanding of presidential decision making in KCTCS.

Quantitative Results

Quantitative results of this study are an extension of the study conducted by Ingram and Tollefson (1996), who examined the location of effective decision making in state community college systems. Based on their data analysis, they conclude that chief executive officers of state community college systems perceive the location of effective decision making in community colleges in their states to be at the campus level regardless of whether the decision involves academic, personnel, or administrative matters.

Furthermore, Ingram and Tollefson (1996) conclude that personnel decisions are more likely to be made locally at the campus level than either academic or administrative decisions.
On the other hand, results from this study suggest differences in the perceived location of decision making among presidents in a single community college system. It is important to note that the results of the Ingram and Tollefson (1996) study reflect
multiple community college systems across the states, while the results of this study reflect a single system. In fact, Ingram and Tollefson assert that the heads of the state community college systems they surveyed “overwhelming identified the location of effective decision making authority in their states as at the local level...;” although, personnel decisions were more likely to be made locally than either academic or administrative decisions (p. 148). The findings of this study illustrated that personnel decision making, more than academic and administrative decision making was more likely to occur at the local college, with some input from the system, but this finding was not significant. Ingram and Tollefson survey heads of state community college systems whereas this study surveyed presidents at a single community college system. A comparison of findings from this study with those of the authors illustrates that differences in the perceived location of decision making when examined at the state, and the system and college levels.
Henry and Creswell (1983) examine the location of decision making across 26 multicampus community college systems for nine selected decision areas gleaned from the literature. Their results suggest that the location of decisions varies with the number of campuses in the system such that as the number of campuses increases, decision making becomes decentralized. In examining the findings of Henry and Creswell in the context of KCTCS, which is comprised of 16 colleges and over 70 campuses, one would assume that decision making is decentralized, or rather, decision making occurs at the local college. On the other hand, the findings of this study suggest differences in the perceived location of decision making among participants with decision making leaning toward the local college, with some input from the system. However, differences in the
perceived location of decision making were noted at the decision area-level and item- level. For KCTCS, the size of the system does not mean that decision making occurs at the local college.
The findings of this study examined in the context of existing literature on decision making in community college systems, specifically the studies conducted by Ingram and Tollefson (1996) and Henry and Creswell (1983), suggest that there are potential differences in the location of decision across community college systems. These differences call for a clear categorization of community college systems, as well as an examination of the location of decision making at multiple levels within individual community college system, in order to understand the implications of the findings.