Government Oversight of Public Universities: Are Centralized Performance Schemes Related to Increased Quantity or Quality?

Universities are engaged in many activities, primarily research and teaching. Many states have instituted performance measures that focus on evaluating a university's success in teaching. We suggest that multitasking may be important in this context, and we consider research outcomes after adoption. We find striking results that depend on university status. Research activity is higher at flagship institutions after the adoption of performance measures. Most of this increase in activity is with respect to the level of research funding and the number of articles produced. In contrast, research funding and the number of publications is dramatically lower at nonflagship institutions. There is some evidence that citations per publication at nonflagship institutions are higher after the adoption of performance standards. The evidence suggests that universities have become more specialized since the introduction of these programs. © 2010 The President and Fellows of Harvard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.