More parents willing to spend on tutorial classes for kids – survey

MANILA, Philippines - Two thirds of households in the Asia-Pacific region are spending on enrichment classes for their children such as academic tuition, learning a foreign language and public speaking on top of regular school fees, according to MasterCard’s latest survey on Consumer Purchasing Priorities – Education.

The report for the Asia-Pacific region included interviews with 7,678 respondents from 16 markets who were asked questions about their education spending priorities. The survey was conducted in Thailand, Bangladesh, China, Japan, Korea, Australia, Malaysia, Myanmar, New Zealand, Taiwan, Vietnam, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Singapore, India and the Philippines.

According to the survey, just over two thirds of consumers in the region save regularly for their children’s education and on average, this takes up 14 percent of their monthly household income.

The highest market is Myanmar at 18 percent; the lowest is New Zealand with eight percent.
The survey   indicated that   more than two thirds of households in  the region spend on enrichment classes: The majority of children in China and South Korea are enrolled in learning a foreign language, while markets such as Australia, New Zealand and the Philippines place more emphasis on sports.

It also showed that more than half of parents in India (54 percent), Taiwan (52 percent) and Thailand (52 percent) are spending on extra tuition classes for their children, closely followed by Malaysia (46 percent), Singapore (45 percent) and Bangladesh (45 percent). Chinese (53 percent) and Korean (50 percent) households were more inclined toward foreign language classes.

More than 50 percent of respondents from Hong Kong preferred their children to learn a musical instrument.
Overall, a third of   consumers in the region intend to take up an educational course in the next year – highest in China (53 percent), South Korea (50 percent), Malaysia (44 percent), Thailand (43 percent), Hong Kong (41 percent), and Singapore (38 percent), and lowest in India (eight percent), Indonesia (12 percent), Japan (14 percent) and Vietnam (16 percent).

An Asia Development Bank (ADB) report into private tutoring last year showed that spending had grown in Asia in recent years. In Hong Kong, more than $255 million was spent on private tutoring for secondary school pupils in 2011. In Japan, families spent $12 billion in 2010 on private tutoring.

“Education is a vital part of the family budget – a large proportion of households are saving specifically to support their family’s educational needs,” says Georgette Tan, group head, Communications, Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa, MasterCard.

“There are some interesting trends to emerge here: A lot of families intend to take up a course this year and the majority is spending on enrichment classes, which is additional spending on top of school fees. This does reflect the growing pressure that is put on children to perform academically across the region. Above all, however, there appears to be little to differentiate how people view education as a critical part of their household spending, in both emerging and developed markets, ” Tan says.