Operations Research and Management Science in Higher Education: An Overview

Operations Research (OR) is an interdisciplinary discipline that evolved during WWII to solve complex operational military problems such as scarce resource allocations and logistics. Thereafter, it has been used successfully in the private and public sectors—including in higher education (HE). The purpose of this chapter is to give an overview of the use of OR methodologies in HE and the functional areas in which they are used. First, a search in 40 OR journals reveals that HE and OR methodology appeared in the title of 0.3% of their articles during 1950–2019. Moreover, in 17 OR journals, HE did not appear in any article. Second, looking at the web of science during 2000–2019, we identified 58 main OR methods relevant to HE. Leading these methods (in terms of the number of articles) is simulation. Third, we identified 30 functional areas relevant to HE. Leading these areas is strategy. For specific methods by area, the leading combination is data envelopment analysis by efficiency. In summary, there is great potential for academics in OR to utilize OR models to improve their own HE system, especially during and after crises such as a pandemic.