Editorial: Implications of shadow education

Recent decades have brought a global expansion of private supplementary tutoring, widely known as shadow education. Malta has been no exception, as more students attend private lessons for various reasons.

A study by a Lithuanian tutoring company which intends to launch in Malta gives interesting insights into the phenomenon of shadow education. Six out of 10 secondary school students in Malta attend private tuition. This is among the highest in Europe; an average of 30 per cent in most other countries is the norm.

Various international studies on shadow education list a mixture of reasons that could motivate parents and students to supplement their education with private tuition. Further studies must be conducted locally to understand what is behind the shadow education boom and what needs to be done to ensure that private tuition benefits students who need it.

Undoubtedly, there is a cultural dimension behind the shadow education phenomenon. Private tutoring has been deeply rooted in Maltese culture for decades. This culture has flourished due to the competitive nature of the educational process and parents’ deep-seated anxiety over their children’s education. It is often claimed that children who join private tutoring feel safe within the school climate and classroom due to their intimacy with the teacher and the extra support they receive through tutoring.

Shadow education also has a profound social dimension. Many parents consider their children are and should be superior to others in school, for which reason they should learn more and learn better. Some parents believe in social competition, and they enrol their children in better educational institutions to maintain a higher status and send them to private tutoring.

Those who can afford it may join private tutoring, leaving behind those who cannot, creating a context of social inequality. In most countries, social inequality in education is increasing because there is a chance that students who do not join private tutoring may have disadvantaged social backgrounds.

The economic dimension of shadow education also needs to be studied more critically. Teachers who act as private tutors often earn more than what they receive as a salary from the school. For parents with low incomes, sending their children for private tutoring is a huge burden. For parents with medium incomes, private tuition is a motivation to help their children achieve better education and be successful in higher education and entrance tests in science and technology subjects.

Policymakers must start asking the question of whether shadow education should remain an unregulated source of income for teachers while at the same time increasing social inequality. Questions also need to be asked whether the low salaries paid to teachers to meet their family’s basic needs are driving the shadow education boom. Various international studies have found that one of the main motivational factors for private tutoring is additional financial gain for teachers, which is becoming an extra economic burden for parents.

The current dispute between the education authorities and teaching staff may indicate that educators’ working conditions may be a factor in the growth of shadow education. Most importantly, policymakers must determine whether the motivating factor for private tutoring is attributed to poor quality mainstream education, less qualified teachers and insufficient mathematics and science teachers.

Private tutoring is being conceived as an indispensable element of schooling. It would be wrong to assume that shadow education guarantees a high achievement for most students.

Policymakers must ensure that private tutoring does not deepen social inequality because students of low socioeconomic status suffer due to low-quality tutoring services in mainstream teaching in our schools.