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Full Professor, and Associate Dean for Research, Innovation and Sustainability, Católica Porto Business School

Maria Silva is Full Professor at the Catholic University, Porto, Portugal. She has got aMSc degree in Management Science and Operational Research from Warwick University in the U.K and a PhD degree in Management Science from Aston University, UK, and the ‘aggregation’ degree by Portuguese Catholic University. She has co-authored over 30 refereed academic publications in the efficiency and productivity analysis area, including applications of Data Envelopment Analysis. She has co-authored, various book chapters like in Cooper W. W. et al. (2004) Handbook on Data Envelopment Analysis and the chapter ‘DEA—The Mathematical Programming Approach to Efficiency Analysis’, in The Measurement of Productive Efficiency and Productivity Growth (H. Fried, et al.  (eds), 2008 Oxford University Press). She has applied the DEA technique in various fields including schools, bank branches, water companies, retail outlets, primary health care General Practice units and hospitals. She has also been the leading researcher of 3 projects financed by the Portuguese Foundation of Science and Technology, who resulted in the development of benchmarking websites for secondary schools and hospitals in Portugal. She has been also involved in consultancy work and acts as Associate Editor of the Journal of Productivity Analysis and is a former associate editor of Omega. She has been involved in several administrative roles in her university like Management MSc director for 3 years, or president of the scientific council for 2.5 years.

DEAves Project – Assessing the efficiency of Portuguese secondary schools

Project financed by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) on assessing the eciency of Portuguese secondary schools (POCI/EGE/60561/2004). Research grant of 42825.00 Euros. This project was done in association with IDMEC – Faculty of Engineering of Porto. This project was undertaken in close cooperation with AVES (Avaliação de Escolas com Secundário) program and allowed the research team to work closely with a reduced number of schools, visiting them on a regular basis and meeting regularly with the directors of the schools in workshops organised by the team. This allowed a good understanding of the education context in the country.

BESP – Developing a benchmarking system for Portuguese secondary schools based on the internet

Two years project financed by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) on developing a benchmarking system for Portuguese secondary schools based on the internet (PTDC/GES/ 68213/2006). Research grant of 60000.00 Euros. This project was done in association with IDMEC – Faculty of Engineering of Porto. The BESP benchmarking website is available here.
This web site allows the general public to compare schools on a set of indicators related to available information on national exams. In addition, schools can register within the  platform an upload additional data, based on which other type of indicators can be calculated online (relating to the resources of the school and to other than exam grades outcomes). The platform has also a tool that allows the computation of an aggregate performance indicator for national schools, which is based on national exam’s data. More than 50 schools are registered and use this site regularly. In the last year (from jan 2013 to Jan 2014) 3325 people visited the site in a total of 5895 visits (85% of which located in Portugal) according to Google analytics.

BESP

HOBE – Developing a benchmarking system for Portuguese Hospitals based on the internet

Three years project financed by the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT) on developing a benchmarking system for Portuguese Hospitals based on the internet (PTDC/EGE-GES/112232/2009). Research grant of 81024.00 Euros. IDMEC – Faculty of Engineering of Porto, also participates in this project.
The benchmarking website is available here. This web site allows the comparison of a variety of services of public hospitals on a set of indicators defi ned at various levels (e.g. quantity and costs) and also incorporates facilities to compute aggregate measures of efficiency, based on Data Envelopment Analysis. Hospitals can therefore compare between themselves on their aggregate performance for a specifi c service (e.g. internal medicine, or cardiology), and also compare themselves on their performance at hospital level (which is an aggregate of their performance at service level).

HOBE