Private Higher Education: A Study of Financial Performance in nine Higher Education Institutions

The higher education institutions have an increasingly important role in the economic and financial performance of a nation. Since then, it has been noticed the growth of this educational segment, mainly guided in the investment of large educational groups. Trying to better understand this phenomenon, this paper develops a study of financial performance in nine higher education institutions. For this, an exploratory multicase study was conducted adopting as units of analysis nine private institutions of higher education: Centro Universitario UNA, Centro Universitario Unimonte, Centro Universitario UNIBH, Kroton, Anhanguera, SEB-COC, Estacio de Sa,PUCMINAS e PUCSP. The data collection occurred through documents internally available in the companies studied, as well as reports and specific statistics on the sector, on websites, newspapers and magazines. Finally, the study shows that, in general, the major players in the segment of higher education have presented a satisfactory financial performance, which may represent a new rearrangement of the sector.