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

Suggestions for Future Research

The broad applicability of theory on governance and decision making in higher education systems makes a case for more quantitative and exploratory studies on presidential decision making in community college systems. Because of the likelihood of a high variability of governance structures across community college systems, additional quantitative and exploratory studies are warranted. Moreover, a methodological approach that includes qualitative procedures and analyses for a defined population such as presidents of campuses or colleges within systems can account for perceptions of decision making as well as the particular governance structure of the systems.

Structural variations in systems across the states suggest that further research should focus on single community college systems with a clear description of its structure. Although Garrett (1993) defines a community college as a state that has one or more public, two-year, postsecondary, educational institutions for the purpose of his study, McGuinness (1991), Johnstone (1999), and Lane (2013) provide a classification of higher education systems that points to structural variations across systems. Henry and Creswell (1983) study 26 multicampus systems, Ingram and Tollefson (1996) study 49 state community college systems, and Fryer and Lovas (1990) study 23 community
colleges primarily in California. Thus, studies that explore decision making in one or a few community college systems can contribute to the literature on decision making in community college systems and help contextualize the results of previous studies.
Birnbaum (1988) makes a claim for the integration of the bureaucratic, political, collegial, and anarchical models because “institutions can share similar core cultural elements and organizational subsystems and still not function in the same way” (p. 176). For this reason, studies examining single institutions can contribute greatly to the applicability of earlier, large sample studies on decision making in community college systems, and further characterize community college systems by providing greater depth of understanding. Then, cumulatively, these studies can be examined to illustrate patterns in decision making processes, community college system governance and characteristics, and presidential leadership.
Finally, studies framing presidential decision making with open systems theories can further expand our understanding of the applicability of open systems theories to higher education systems, and especially to community college systems. Specifically, studies that include qualitative observations of presidential meetings in community college systems can provide a better understanding of behaviors, cultural and environmental factors, and institutional contexts that affect presidential decision making. Similarly, framing studies on presidential decision making with open systems theories provides yet another lens with which to understand presidential decision making, as opposed to framing presidential decision making with primarily structural theories of governance.