RESEARCH ON THE QUALITY OF SERVICES FROM A TECHNICAL UNIVERSITY IN AN EDUCATIONAL MANAGEMENT FRAMEWORK

Numerous studies conducted recently in the field of the educational service management showed that the satisfaction of the students has beneficial effects on the degree of participation in the various activities proposed by the university, the motivation of the students, the attraction of the future students and, implicitly, the increase of the university's incomes. Nowadays, the educational service does not only refer to the professor-student relationship, to which is added the novelty and the way of structuring and presentation of the lectures. The process includes all the stages from the enrolment of the student in the university by completing the application form, attending the study program and, finally, including the student among the graduates. Measuring service quality in higher education has become an important condition for determining the level of the students' satisfaction in order to maintain the attractiveness of the educational services among the young and interested audiences. This paper focuses on measuring and quantifying the quality of the educational service in one of the largest and most famous technical universities in Romania, more precisely, it is about Politehnica University of Bucharest. The conclusion of the National Exercise Report on the University Metaranking in 2016, elaborated by the Romanian Ministry of Education and Scientific Research, showed that 20 universities in Romania, all of them being public universities, managed to pass a minimum threshold of visibility into the international rankings of the universities. From the top 20, the best five higher education institutions fall into the category of Romanian universities with potential for excellence, visible and with international impact: "Babes-Bolyai" University of Cluj-Napoca (1), University of Bucharest (2), "Politehnica" University of Bucharest (3), "Alexandru loan Cuza" University of Iasi (4) and West University of Timisoara (5). The SERVQUAL model was used as a conceptual framework for this research, and the tools used for data collection were the model-specific questionnaires for finding out our students' expectations and perceptions of the educational service provided. The research was targeted to students who have benefited from the bachelor and master programs, from several years of studies and faculties within the Politehnica University of Bucharest. The results of the research are a starting point for the adoption of measures aimed at improving the overall quality level of the educational services in the technical higher education. Several aspects have been taken into consideration, such as: the relationship of the university's staff with the students, the observance of the promises made, strengthening trust among the students, the empathy with the students etc. The students' perspective on the educational service quality was followed up in this research, but in the future, further investigations may be developed from the business environment's perspective, the community's perspective and from the other stakeholders' perspective.