What Factors Influence High School Students in Choosing Cram School in Thailand

The objective of this study was to provide cram school entrepreneurs with guidelines for formulating their business strategies to satisfy their customers. More specifically, this research investigated which factors influence students in junior high and high school when they choose a so-called "cram school" for tutoring; it also assessed whether the factors affecting each group are different. Data were collected through questionnaires administered to a sample group of 198 junior high students and 198 senior high students. A Likert scale was employed to assess the level of importance of factors involved in choosing a cram school and the Mann-Whitney U test was used to determine the differences in factors' degree of importance between junior high and senior high students. The results showed that the teaching-learning factor and location factor influence both groups' choice of cram school. This study suggests that cram school entrepreneurs should use student evaluations of teachers, academic content, and other services as feedback tools to improve the quality of cram schools, which in turn will benefit both students and the entrepreneurs' businesses. In addition, entrepreneurs should provide a suggestion box, e-mail address, and Facebook or Twitter account so that students and their parents can communicate directly with their school.