Theoretical And Methodological Peculiarities Of Perceived Quality In Higher Education

The study focuses its attention on the peculiarities of the conceptof consumer assessmentof quality in the area of higher education. During the past few years therehave been serious debates in the public space in Bulgaria, in the countries of "the new democracies" and in the European education area with respect to the issue of what is quality in higher education and are theinstitutions which provide such education of good quality. An ever-increasing number of institutionsoffer training at the various levels of higher education. The global tendency toward agхing of thepopulation reduces the inflow of those seeking this kind of services in the most developed countries.It becomesmore and more important for Universities to attract the attention of primary and secondaryconsumers, proving that they provide quality education and quality labour force at the output ofthe system. In order for this task to be possible it is necessary that Universities are aware of whatthe content of quality according to consumers is, i.e. they should be familiar with whattheperceivedquality is.In the present study there is mainly used the marketing approach combined with thepsychological approach in the conceptualization of the nature of perceived quality. There havebeen applied the following: the method of theoretical analysis and synthesis, the method of deskstudy in its two varieties - analysis of secondary sources and content analysis