Aukštojo mokslo studijų finansavimo modelių ir jų įtakos studijų prieinamumui vertinimas Europos Sąjungos valstybėse

Abstract

The scientific problem of dissertation: how to evaluate the impact of higher education funding models on access to higher education. The higher education funding models, funding methods, theoretical aspects of access to higher education, the methodologies for evaluating the impact of higher education funding models on access to higher education are analyzed, the advantages and disadvantages of the applied evaluation methods are determined. A new research methodology is used to evaluate the impact of higher education funding models on access to higher education in the context of EU countries and in the groups of countries, which apply different higher education funding models based on cost-sharing. EU countries are grouped into four higher education funding models based on economic indicators relevant to higher education funding, using cluster analysis. A panel data analysis method (fixed effects model) is used for the impact evaluation. The results of the dissertation show that higher education funding models by cost-sharing (i.e., low tuition-high-subsidy; low-tuition-lowsubsidy; high tuition-low-subsidy; high-tuition-high-subsidy higher education funding models) have a different statistically significant impact on access to higher education. Besides, EU countries, that apply a high-tuitionhigh-subsidy higher education funding model, provide better results of gender equality as well as better represent low (middle) socio-economic status students in higher education, in comparison to other EU countries, that use other higher education funding models.