Construction and Validation of External Efficiency Evaluation Questionnaire of university graduates

The purpose of this study was to construct and validate the External Performance Questionnaire of university graduates. External efficiency actually determines the degree of responsiveness of graduates to society in the individual, social, and economic dimensions. The research method is descriptive and its approach is applied. The study population consisted of 3056 graduates of Qom University from 2012 to 2014, that 350 graduates were selected using stratified random sampling method proportional to the volume of classes in several stages. The research instrument was a researcher-made questionnaire. The Waltz method (2010) was used to design the questionnaire and based on purposeful review of existing literature and external performance questionnaires, the initial questionnaire was designed with 25 items. After validation of face and content validity of the questionnaire by 10 university experts, construct validity was performed by exploratory and confirmatory factor analysis. Internal reliability of the questionnaire was determined by Cronbach's alpha. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used for data analysis. The results showed that External Efficacy Questionnaire has 20 questions and three dimensions - individual, social and economic and has good reliability, validity and fitness in psychometric. Confirmatory factor structure confirmed the proposed three-factor model of the questionnaire. Therefore, the developed questionnaire, due to the robustness of the factor structure and appropriate psychometric properties, can be used by other researchers to determine its external efficacy and it is recommended to use it.