Higher education is the third-biggest export industry in Australia. Hence, the quality of the governance of educational institutions is of major concern to the Australian Government. Although evaluation of board performance is now used widely in both the private and public sectors, little attention has been given to its application in university contexts. This article addresses this gap. It describes a comparative analysis of various criteria used to conduct board assessments with a framework developed in Australia to guide evaluation of a university council's performance. In particular, it describes the components of the University Council Assessment Questionnaire. This article concludes by making some recommendations about how the use of assessment can contribute to improving a council's performance.
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