Six out of 10 secondary school students in Malta attend private tuition, according to a survey.

Mathematics was the most popular subject for tutoring across all ages, followed by Maltese, English and physics, according to research into tutoring trends.

The research shows that the least likely to attend private lessons were children in early years primary education, aged between four and seven. However, even in this age group, some 29% of children attended private lessons.

Among four- to seven-year-olds, Maltese was the most sought subject.

The certified quantitative research exercise, completed by Esprimi in February, was conducted among 500 parents of children aged four to 18.

For respondents, the main advantages of tutoring included the need to do extra work (47%) and for individual attention (33%), as well as to tackle significant difficulties within the subjects students were attending private lessons for.

The survey was commissioned by a Lithuanian tutoring company, Mokosi, which intends to launch in Malta and was aimed at understanding the market and the mindset.

Its CEO, Jurgita Jaruseviciene, who has worked in tutoring for 17 years, believed the topic of the study and its findings would give rise to “wide discussion about the effectiveness of the education system in Malta”.

Malta’s 60% rate is high, she said, maintaining that other countries showed an average of 30 per cent.

In Armenia at the top end of the scale, 90% of secondary students attended private lessons, while in Nordic countries like Sweden, the figure was as low as 10%, Jaruseviciene said.

She quoted a study on shadow education in Europe: ‘Growing Prevalence, Underlying Forces, and Policy Implications’, which said that only in Northern Europe did shadow education remain modest in scale, but it was growing there too.

According to a 2008 study of Maltese Grade 10 students – ‘Various aspects behind private tuition: A study among Form 4 secondary schools’ – 51.9% were receiving tutoring and 77.9% had done so at some time in their school lives.

Pupils in the high-performing schools were more likely to receive tutoring and devote longer hours than pupils in the lower performing schools, the researchers had found.

The high number of private lessons in Malta could be cultural, it could have implications on the education system, or be the result of a mix of both

A decade earlier, another study had found that 50.5% of a sample of 1,482 upper primary and lower secondary pupils had received tutoring at some time.

“The high number of private lessons in Malta could be cultural, it could have implications on the education system, or be the result of a mix of both,” Jaruseviciene said.

Parents don't want to drive, but online learning not popular

The trend in Western Europe was now for “quick, individual and simple” crash courses that meant students did not need to spend a whole year studying to get results, Jaruseviciene said.

While the global tendency is for individual lessons, in Malta, the children are more likely to study in groups, the research showed.

The older the age bracket, the larger the groups, with over 30% of 16- to 18-year-olds joining classes of more than 10 students.

This appeared to be an anomaly, Jaruseviciene highlighted, as the research showed that among parents’ top priorities, the majority of respondents (61%) wanted their children to be in smaller classes.

Asked about online private lessons, over half would have considered that option, with the highest level of interest among 16- to 18-year-olds.

The main concerns about this form of learning included difficulty in staying focused and for the tutor to gauge non-verbal reactions to explanations.

Although the market research revealed that parents did not want to drive their children far for private lessons, online learning was still not too popular in Malta.

A close location was important for half of them, while the least important priority was the possibility of online/blending learning approaches.

The average hourly rate of private lessons across the age groups was €10, with the highest going up to €14 for students at post-secondary level – 16 to 18 years old – attending twice a week.

While the price was not considered high, the money spent on tutoring in Malta was “big”, Jaruseviciene said, maintaining that while teachers may not earn enough, there was “another market”.

Parents believed that online lessons, currently being attended by 42% of the survey participants, should be cheaper than face-to-face tuition. But most of those who were already being tutored remotely were not paying less.

The findings shed light on a “grey zone” in the tax system when it came to private lessons and indicated it was “not really regulated”, Jaruseviciene said, ahead of talks with the education ministry.

Speaking about the situation in Lithuania, where she comes from, and where individual online private lessons were partially funded by the government, Jaruseviciene said peer-to-peer learning – whereby older students would give lessons for free as part of a required 20 hours of social work in order to attend university – was encouraged.