Does Private University Business Education Meet Market Expectations? A Case Study on North South University

The increasing number of students getting enrolled in private universities in Bangladesh brings into light the question whether or not the universities are able to develop the graduate skills in response to employers’ expectations and market expectations. Therefore, this paper seeks to explore this specific question with a survey conducted on the employers of one leading private institution - North South University. The employers were asked to rate the performance of the graduates on a questionnaire based on Likert scale. The data was collected on three periods. Initially, Binomial test of proportions was used on whole year’s data to figure out whether there was any statistically significant difference between the satisfactory and the non-satisfactory responses. Furthermore, Pearson chi-square test was used to explore whether the satisfaction-dissatisfaction proportion were same or varied among the three semesters. The result showed that the employers’ perception is either moderately or very satisfactory with the students’ technical skills, work ethics, and eagerness to learn. This study is one of its first kind which focuses on identifying the skills of private university graduates required by employers of Bangladesh. The paper suggests a new mean of measuring graduate quality of a tertiary institutions which uses direct feedback from the employers. The results can give the policymakers ideas on areas of improvement and can even help universities prepare their graduates better