University-Business cooperation in education. Real and perceived performances

The purpose of this paper is to describe and demonstrate the validity of a methodology to distinguish, in the performances of high education institutions (HEIs), real from perceived performances. The extension of accountability to the evaluation of educational programs involves significant topics concerning the gap between perceived and real performances. It means that, since many actors such as teachers, students, and external stakeholders are involved in the process, the research on methodologies to distinguish subjective from objective parameters is still on the floor. Debate about performance evaluation in this collaboration is still in progress particularly as it concerns the proposal of several parameters and indexes to quantify the topic and reduce the subjectivism in the assessment and the gap between real and perceived performances. After describing and discussing an evaluation model based on three interdependent typologies of indexes, this will be tested in two Tempus projects having the purpose of activating Ph.D. and masters courses. The results encourage deepening researches in this direction and disseminating this methodology and extending and enriching the validation process.