Educational efficiency and optimal use of resources: A comparative study through the use of data envelopment analysis

Abstract

Education is considered the basic tool for providing individuals with knowledge and skills in order to ensure development. It
primarily ensures the accumulation of knowledge reserves, or which are known as the cognitive assets of society, and thus it
builds a knowledge society and goes beyond that to building an economy based on knowledge through the added value that it
creates. This study aims to Search for a method to estimate the optimal or best use of available educational resources, and relying
on benchmarking through a quantitative method known as data envelopment analysis for a sample group estimated at 49
countries, and based on the BCC-O model with the hypothesis of benchmarking between countries, the study proved that The
average efficiency under the assumption of changing returns to scale (TEVRS) was 88.7%, while the number of countries that
achieved the level of complete efficiency reached 14 countries. As for Algeria, it achieved the lowest level of efficiency at 58.1%
and ranked last among countries. That is, within the limits of current spending, Algeria achieved the lowest level of cognitive
outputs in light of comparison with the results of other countries.