Autonomy Acquisition and Performance within Higher Education in Vietnam—A Road to a Sustainable Future?
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe study is of scientific interest. The topic of the article is relevant. The article focuses on measuring the effectiveness of Vietnamese universities in the context of autonomy from 2018 to 2021. The authors illustrate the correlation between university autonomy and efficiency. However, the goal is not clearly formulated in the article.
To improve the perception of the article by readers, authors need to answer the following questions:
1. “We collected information from 32 universities (out of 236 HEIs) from 2018-2021 based 186 on the availability of data published on websites and the Google Scholar Database” (line 186-187). What is the reason for selecting these 32 universities? Are they private or public?
2. How were public universities financed before 2018? And what changes have occurred since 2018? Financing also affects efficiency. The authors indicate the impact of investment in the article. However, it is not clear how funding has changed with the acquisition of autonomy.
3. “We found that private universities exhibited more remarkable performance progress than their public counterparts” (line 492-493). How was this conclusion reached? What does it follow from?
4. Why was the Google Scholar database used (p.4) and not some other database (for example, Scopus)? Do Google citations really measure the quality of research?
5. The list of references is extensive. However, only 24% of the source - no more than five years ago (2019 – 2023 years). Research on this topic requires up-to-date scientific information.
Minor point: Section number 2.2. written three times
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageModerate editing of English language required
Author Response
Please see the attachment.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsDear Authors!
The issue of autonomy in higher education is a global issue, so the topic can be considered relevant and current, especially in the sense that it really supports sustainability.
The focus and purpose of the research are defined in the abstract, but the methodology used by the authors should be highlighted more clearly. It is also necessary to mention the data file used in addition to the main results. We do not usually use source designations in the abstract, so it can be omitted.
Just over one page of the 12-page study deals with the theoretical background, so I would recommend changing the structure of the paper. In this chapter, the background of the three key variables (TFPCH, EFFCH, TECHCH) should be presented. This partly requires an expansion of the literature, on the other hand, certain elements can be carried over from the "methodology" and "results" chapters. The theoretical overview contains several reference errors that should be corrected:
- Page 2: Albrecht (2013) – Not the sole author and not the first author, but Ziderman.
- Page 2: Tilak (2000) – The study is from 2003.
- Page 2: Agasisti (2020) – Not the only author.
- Page 2: Aghion (2010) – Not the only author.
- Page 2: Belgaroui & Aithal (2021) – The name of the second author (Hamad) is not correct.
- Page 2: Clarice (1984) - not the only author.
It would also be worthwhile to review the sources used, as 31 of the 59 cited sources are older than 10 years and no source from the selected journal (Sustainability) is used. In the case of references, the designation of doi number is optional, this should be standardized. Furthermore, sources 3. and 9. are duplicates.
The methodology is presented correctly, but I would already indicate the data source in the first paragraph, so that the DEA procedure used can be logically explained. Regarding the "sample", it was not revealed to me how many of the 32 universities were public and how many were private?
It would help the reader a lot if a diagram were prepared at the end of Chapter 2, which shows the used explanatory and explained variables together with the indicators in their context. I consider this necessary because the study uses a lot of abbreviations and the researcher's intention only becomes clear after reading it several times. The operationalization of the independent variables (STUNUMBER, FANUMBER, HQFNUMBER ...) appears only in the results chapter (Table 6), even though it would be more worthwhile to present it in the methodology chapter. Note: The names of variables X7 and X8 in Table 6 do not match those described in the text (typo).
The authors describe the evaluation system of Table 1 showing educational and research efficiency in a correct and followable manner, but it is necessary to refer back to Table 1 in the text.
The statistical calculations of the results are basically in order and the authors evaluate this in an appropriate way. In table 5, it is not clear to me why it presents the results of the period 2018-2021 based on the data of the index values for 2019, 2020 and 2021? (Correctly: Period 2019-2021?). Do the period results show an arithmetic mean? If so, then TECHCH = 1.093 and TFPCH = 1.102).
The names of the axis in Figure 1 would help the interpretation.
In the conclusion, it would be worthwhile to draw attention to the limitations of the research. On the one hand, the operation of the higher education system cannot be considered homogeneous, so the results cannot be generalized. On the other hand, the study does not deal with specifics such as the profile of the university (e.g. how many faculties the university has, teaching-research university). This is also important because it can greatly influence the results of the scoring system (e.g. number of students or citations). Finally, the presented scoring system may also result in biases (teaching and research efficiency).
Comments on the Quality of English Language
The study requires minor language editing.
Author Response
Please find the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors raise the issue of the effectiveness of higher education. I personally found it interesting to read that full-time professors are not legally compulsory in the Bachelor's study programmes, that internal management inefficiencies are a major obstacle to the overall efficiency of a university, etc.
The theoretical part analyses a wide range of literature, although the year of publication of the selected sources is a bit confusing at times: 9 sources are not only older than the last 6-10 years, but they come from the 1970s-1990s. This would be excusable if the analysis had a historical perspective, but it is about effectiveness today.
The paper describes the research methodology in detail, in particular the sections Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) and Malmquist Productivity Change Measurement.
I expected more from the discussion section; perhaps further actions/research directions could have been outlined. The conclusions are vague.
Suggestions are the following:
In the theoretical part, the possibility of replacing outdated literature with newer sources should be considered.
The authors write “We collected information from 32 universities (out of 236 HEIs) from 2018-2021 based on the availability of data published on websites and the Google Scholar Database”. It is not clear whether only these universities had data available and therefore their information was analyzed, or whether there were other selection criteria.
The discussion section, especially Part 2, should be strengthened by linking it to other studies.
Conclusions should be made more specific without explaining what has been done, e.g. we conducted regressions with these indices as independent variables to identify the 488 factors influencing these indices.
Author Response
Please find the attachment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 1 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors have responded to the comments on all points of the previous peer review. They have made appropriate corrections. The article is of scientific interest and is recommended for publication.
Comments on the Quality of English LanguageMinor editing of English language required
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you very much!
Reviewer 2 Report
Comments and Suggestions for AuthorsThe authors have made most of the corrections I requested. The literature of the theoretical overview (introduction) has been expanded but not in substance.
The naming of the axes in Figure 1 is still not clear because they are not named in the figure.
Overall, with the corrections made, the paper is acceptable.
Author Response
Dear reviewer,
Thank you very much for your careful corrections. I accepted them all except for the "sustainability development (SD)" at the beginning of the paper.
I also corrected some writings. They are highlighted in yellow.
Please see the revised manuscript attached.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
