ABSTRACT The paper examines factors that influence academic board members’ participation in decision making within the college. From this perspective, the researcher argues that, how board members view the formal and informal structures of the college directly and indirectly affect their participation in decision making. Board members’ characteristics, such as age gender and status also influence their participation in decision making. This study shows that elements of a school’s formal and informal structures and of board members’ attributes directly and indirectly. Most notably the variables which exhibit substantial influence on participation in decision making include two measures of the formal structure which are the schools and the management level. I hope the abstract can help