Institute researchers Mihaela Bronić and Simona Prijaković presented the paper „Pure technical efficiency and its determinants: a two-stage analysis of public general high schools in Croatia” (with co-author Branko Stanić) at two international conferences in September. Bronić presented the paper at the „4th CEE-Loc Conference 2026”, held on September 17 and 18 in Skopje, while Prijaković presented it at the „KOI 2026 – 21st International Conference on Operational Research”, held on September 23 to 25 in Brela.

The paper analyses the efficiency of public general high schools in Croatia during the 2024/2025 school year, their success in transforming available educational resources into measurable educational outcomes. The first stage of the research employs Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to assess pure technical efficiency, while the second stage uses Simar-Wilson double bootstrap regression analysis to examine factors associated with pure technical efficiency differences in public general high schools.

An initial version of the paper was presented, and comments and suggestions received during the discussions will be used for its further refinement. The researchers will analyse the suggestions and, where necessary, further develop the methodological and substantive aspects of the study. The conferences were attended by researchers and experts from the fields of operations research, quantitative methods, economics, public administration, political science, and sociology.

Participation in the conferences was funded by the European Union (NextGenerationEU) under the project Efficiency of public services at local government levels – definitions, measurements and analyses.