Developing and Validating Sustainability Indicators for Measuring Social Impact of University–Community Engagement Programs

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

1. Topic is too lengthy to capture the audience's attention, it must be reduced to 12 words only.

2. Aim of the study be added to the abstract, and also add research design to the abstract.

3. From the introductory section it seems that material is dumped thoughtlessly.

4. Separately write an introduction section of at least one page.

5. Add a new section of review of the existing studies/ literature.

6. Results section if fine.

7. Add section on contributions, limitations, and implication for future research after conclusion section.

8. Add section on contribution of each authors as well as declaration of interest.

Comments on the Quality of English Language

Needs minor improvement

Author Response

Comments 1: The topic is too lengthy to capture the audience’s attention, it must be reduced to 12 words only.

Response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. We agree with this comment. Therefore, we revised and reduced the topic from “Developing social impact measurement indicators for local community engagement projects toward sustainable development at higher education institutions” to “Developing and Validating Sustainability Indicators for Measuring Social Impact of University-Community Engagement Programs.”

Comments 2: Aim of the study be added to the abstract, and research design to the abstract.

Response 2: Agree. We revised the abstract to emphasize the aim of the study and the research design.

Comments 3: From the introduction section, it seems that material is dumped thoughtlessly.

Response 3: Agree. We revised the introduction to connect and summarize each paragraph more effectively.

Comments 4: Separately write an introduction section of at least one page.

Response 4: Agree. We separate an introduction and literature review sections to emphasize this point.

Comments 5: Add a new section of review of the existing studies/literature.

Response 5: Agree. To emphasize this point, we added a new review section on the topic: Overview of existing literature for social impact measurement indicators.  Comments 6: Add a section on contribution, limitations, and implications for future research after the conclusion section. Response 6: Agree. We add a section on limitations and implications for future research to emphasize this point. Comments 7: Add a section on the contribution of each author as well as a declaration of interest. Response 7: Agree. We added a section on author contribution to emphasize this point.

 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

SIM abbreviation is not deciphered in the abstract (Social Impact Measurement).

A clear research question/s are not defined.

In text line 322, reference [69] does not have a hyperlink to bibliography.

There is an excess of bibliographic sources relative to the scope of the article; conducting a comprehensive and qualitative analysis of all of them within the article's framework is questionable.

References should not be used in the conclusions, as the conclusions should be drawn from the research conducted by the authors. References fit into the discussion section.

At the end, the limitations of the study and the possibilities of generalization, as well as the sustainability potential of the determined indicators, should be clarified.

Author Response

Comments 1: SIM abbreviation is not deciphered in the abstract (Social Impact Measurement).

Response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. We agree with this comment. Therefore, we revised the abstract to emphasize this point.

Comments 2: A clear research question(s) is not defined.

Response 2: Agree. We defined a research question in the final paragraph of the introduction section to emphasize this point.

Comments 3: In text line 322, reference [69] does not have a hyperlink to bibliography.

Response 3: Agree. We modified the endnote of the reference [69] as follows: [71]  Lazzarini, S.G. The measurement of social impact and opportunities for research in business administration. RAUSP Management Journal 2018, 53, 134-137, doi:10.1016/j.rauspm.2017.12.010.

Comments 4: There is an excess of bibliographic sources relative to the scope of the article; conducting a comprehensive and qualitative analysis of all of them within the article's framework is questionable.

Response 4: Agree. We revised the bibliography to emphasize this point.

Comments 5: References should not be used in the conclusions, as the conclusions should be drawn from the research conducted by the authors. References fit into the discussion section.

Response 5: Agree. To emphasize this point, we removed references in the conclusions.

Comments 6: At the end, the limitations of the study and the possibilities of generalization, as well as the sustainability potential of the determined indicators, should be clarified.

Response 6: Agree. We add a section on limitations and implications for future research to emphasize this point.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

The article is very interesting and addresses Local Community Engagement Projects toward Sustainable Development at Higher Education Institutions.

The statistical analysis is accurate and well-conducted, and the bibliography is up-to-date.

As recommendation, since the analysis was conducted only locally on the Khanab Nak community in the Pak Phanang River Basin, Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Thailand, we suggest outlining the study's limitations. Therefore, it is recommended to add the main limitations and possibilities for expanding the research topic to a broader level.

Author Response

Comments 1: As a recommendation, since the analysis was conducted only locally on the Khanab Nak community in the Pak Phanang River Basin, Nakhon Si Thammarat Province, Thailand, we suggest outlining the study's limitations. Therefore, it is recommended to add the main limitations and possibilities for expanding the research topic to a broader level.

Response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. We agree with this comment. Therefore, we add a section on limitations and implications for future research to emphasize this point.  

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Thank you very much for the invitation to review the manuscript. I have carefully read the contents of the manuscript, and I find it overall to be quite coherent and comprehensive. Below, I will provide some comments and questions from the following aspects:

1.     The research topic of this paper is entirely consistent with the objectives of the journal, focusing on how higher education institutions can promote local sustainable development, which is an important and popular topic. From the perspective of the research topic, there are no issues, and it can be published in the journal.

2.     The data analysis process of the paper is relatively standard but appears somewhat redundant. Table 4 shows that the three extracted common factors can only represent sixty percent of the information, which is a relatively low proportion. This indicates that the extracted common factors cannot fully represent the original scale.

3.     After rotation, some factor loadings in Table 5 are relatively low.

4.     In Figure 2, the authors did not report the degrees of freedom. There should be an indicator of chi-square divided by degrees of freedom here, rather than just reporting the chi-square.

5.     The content in the discussion section is too brief. The discussion section should thoroughly compare the research results of this study with existing research results.

6.     There is a lack of a section on research limitations. The areas where the author's research results cannot be generalized should be fully explained in the research limitations section.

7.     The conclusion section should list clear conclusions.

Author Response

Comments 1: In Figure 2, the authors did not report the degrees of freedom. There should be an indicator of chi-square divided by degrees of freedom here, rather than just reporting the chi-square.

Response 1: Thank you for pointing this out. We agree with this comment. Therefore, we reported the degrees of freedom.

Comments 2: The content in the discussion section is too brief. The discussion section should thoroughly compare the research results of this study with existing research results.

Response 2: Agree. We revised the discussion section to emphasize this point.

Comments 3: There is a lack of a section on research limitations. The areas where the author's research results cannot be generalized should be fully explained in the research limitations section.

Response 3: Agree. We add a section on limitations and implications for future research to emphasize this point.

Comments 4: The conclusion section should list clear conclusions.

Response 4: Agree. We revised the conclusion section to emphasize this point.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 4 Report

Comments and Suggestions for Authors

Accept in present form