Study On The Cases Of Economic Functions And Scale Economy Of Higher Vocational Education

On the basis of a systematic and profound analysis of the economic functions of higher vocational education (HVE) in our country, and by introducing the concept and the method of data mining and from a starting point of the size and benefits of HVE analyzed with SPSS, the cases in 248 higher vocation colleges and 1093 higher learning institutions in China and that in higher vocational colleges (HVC) and higher learning institutions in Hubei from 1998 and 2002 are studied in the aspects of revenue and expenditure, source and constitution and internal effect of education in order to explore the way to give play to the economic functions of the HVE in our country. Since 1999, there has been a historical leap in our higher learning education that the HVE in the national higher learning education system and pattern has been raised to an unprecedentedly high position and it has drawn a wide social attention with its obvious economic functions, and some problems have appeared subsequently which can not be neglected. For instance, the realization of rapid expansion of HVE, to a considerable degree, relies on the newly-built or newly-added "assessories"; the education effect of HVC as a whole is lower than the average level of the universities and colleges in our country, which is reflected in small size or no size in some sense and general inadequacy of the utility of teaching staff and teaching equipment. As a result, there are not satisfactory economic returns. In a sense, the problems show that the investment of our HVE is distributed in a scattered way and there is an excessive stress on the increase in the number of higher vocation education institutions in the process of rapid expansion in the field of vocational education. As far as education income and expenses are concerned, most of higher vocation colleges are in the red. The major causes of these problems are the serious inadequacy of national education investment and the limited sources and ways of collection of education funds, so a great number of local HVC are in a hard time and even face a crisis. The shortage of funds are growing into a sharp contradiction between need and supply, which has resulted in a situation where the funds collected in varied ways are distributed, assigned and used up. Even so, the funds are far from enough to meet the demands of reality. The findings of the case study show there is not an all-inclusive effect in our higher vocation education. In the present distribution pattern of higher learning education funds, the size is an important factor deciding the education income and expenses per student in a college. There are the minimum total education expenses and the regular education expenses existing in colleges of different sizes, no matter what jurisdiction they are under, what region they are in, what disciplines and levels they belong to. In other words, there is a proper size for a college of any kind. Moreover, the returns of utilization of the internal education resources in colleges vary with different sizes. Under the size of 5000 students, the total education expenses per student reduce with the expansion of size, the returns of internal education resources increase; over this size, the total education expenses grow gradually, and the returns of utilization of the internal education resources reduce gradually (as far as the education regular expenses are concerned, the proper size of minimum expenditure is between 5000 and 8000 students). The main reasons are: the utilization effect of human resource in HVC is relatively low with a number of students borne by teaching staff from 1999 to 2002 taking up only 60% of the average level of higher learning institutions; the utilization effect of material resources is relative low, which is from 50% to 91% in the aspects of teaching equipment, books in library and the conditions of teaching area including classrooms, libraries, laboratories and practice fields; the utilization of financial resources is relatively complicated. The proportion of the size of HVE takes up 11.1% of the total size of nation ordinary higher education, but its expenditure is 17.3% of that of the whole education and the absolute value of total education expenditure per student and that of education regular expenditure are far below the average level of all higher learning institutions in our country. Therefore, there are comparatively great potentialities in the development of HVE. There is no definite answer to the question how to coordinate the development of HVE and that of economy and society. The practice in many countries, especially in developing countries, indicates the development of HVE does not match or adjust to the speed, scope, constitution and level of national economic development, or even overweighs the supporting capacity of national economy and national financial revenue. "Over education" and the "explosion of diplomas" will possibly bring about many serious social problems. We must face the problems of this kind in the future, turn pressure into motives and impel the higher education reform and the renewable development. The keylies in the adjustment in the constitution of higher education and the pattern of personnel cultivation, and HVE will bear more pressure in different respects. The funds for HVE are distributed in a scattered way, which is unfavorable for its development as a whole and the improvement of its quality and likely to result in the low returns of education investment and a waste of education resources in short supply. Though the mechanism of collecting education funds from various channels has initially been established, there emerges many questions with a background of education funds shortage, such as: does it propel education or scatter the energy of running education to go in for college-run accessories? Is this a makeshift or the only way out? These questions are worth serious consideration. In order to get out of the tense situation of the management of HVE and focus its strength on teaching activities and the improvement of education quality, the key lies in the increase in education investment. Therefore, some suggestions are made in this paper as follows: 1) the government is requested that the three "increases" regulated in Law of Education be fully implemented; 2) HVC should be allowed to be a corporate body of college management, which enjoys a policy-making right to a degree and independent benefits and takes corresponding risks of management. In this way, an interior motive of pursuing benefits is to take shape; 3) Some related policies and some supervising mechanism and organizations should be established to restrain the college investors; 4) some budget and fund-allocating regulations and should be set up to give some exterior stimuli to colleges so as to guarantee the maximum utilization effect of education resources. In the reality of the large social system, the utilization effect of interior resources in HVC can definitely not be separated from the returns of whole HVE, they should be complementary and presuppose each other. For this purpose, HVC must lay stress on education quality and cultivate various personnel adapting to economic construction and meeting the needs of social development; a proper structure of human resources is to be determined to reinforce the training of teaching staff and improve its quality as a whole with the advantages of good college facilities and less teaching burden for the part of teachers; a proper construction of material resources is to be determined with a stress on increasing the utilization rate and returns of various material resources.