한국생산성학회

We have witnessed quantitative growth of kindergartens recently. In literature, quality of kindergartens in the early childhood education have been emphasized. However, only a few studies have examined efficiency of kindergarten operations. We evaluate efficiencies of kindergartens in 17 cities and provinces in Korea using a DEA-AR model based on triangular distribution. While the efficiency of various educational institutions has been evaluated in the literature, evaluating the efficiency of kindergartens is limited to simply measuring the operating efficiency of the kindergartens and the trends by year. In this study, we compare the efficiency by subdividing into public and private ones. By compare efficiency of public, private and local differences, this study can be used as relevant data to benchmark an exemplary kindergarten or to provide future policy directions of kindergarten operation. When the number of regions to be evaluated compared to the number of input and output variables is too small, the efficiency of the original DEA model tends to be overestimated, Thus we use DEA-AR model based on triangular distribution proposed by Eum et al.(2019). Variables for DEA evaluation are selected from literature review. We find that as the judgement of the evaluator becomes clear, more conservative evaluation results than the original DEA-AR model are generated, and show that there is a significant statistical difference between the results. We also test efficiencies of public and private kindergartens and show statistical difference. The results of this study can be used as decision-support materials, such as related research or government policies.