Service Quality Provided by Kindergartens from the Perspective of Parents: A Study Using (Servequal) Scale

Abstract

The study aimed at identifying the gap between the perceptions of parents in Al-Ahsa Governorate in KSA, and their expectations for the level of service quality provided by the kindergartens in which their children had been enrolled. Arandom sample of parents was selected, and it included (147) individuals. The study used SERVQUAL scale to measure the service quality developed by)Parasuraman et al,1988), after it had been translated and developed to meet the requirements of the service quality in kindergartens. After its development, the scale included (30)sub-items measuring (5) dimensions of service quality in kindergartens. The results of the study showed that there were no statistically significant differences at the level of (0.05) attributed to each of the two variables of the kindergartens' category (public-private) ,and the variable of gender (male-female)from the perspective of parents in all dimensions of the service quality provided. The results of the study also showed that there was an impact attributed to the difference of the educational qualification of the parents of children, and this difference was statistically significant at the level (0.01) in the first dimension of tangibles in favor of postgraduate studies, and at the level (0.05) in the second dimension of reliability in favor of post studies, and in the questionnaire as a whole in favor of the bachelor. There was no impact attributed to the difference in the educational qualifications of the parents of the children in the dimensions of response, safety and empathy.