Abstract
Because of increasing competition among Latvian higher education institutions (HEIs), the administrators of these institutions are becoming increasingly interested in understanding how their potential students choose their institution. Comprehensive knowledge of consumer behavior allows institutions to become more effective at making good strategic marketing decisions and to better respond to customers’ needs. The purpose of this study is to understand what factors affect the decision of secondary school leavers in choosing a particular higher education provider and the variables that might predict a student’s choice. The research is based on data collected by the means of a survey distributed among final year students of Latvian secondary schools, with 644 responses analyzed using Spearman correlation and stepwise regression analysis. Analysis of four major groups of factors: cultural, social, psychological, and organizational, revealed that psychological and organizational factors are the best predictors of the choice of HEI. These explained 48% of the variance of the dependent variable (R2 = 0.48; F (1; 641) = 293.46; p < 0.001). The results provide details of the factors with great importance to young people of Latvia in choosing their higher education provider. The HEI can use these factors for designing various student attraction strategies, and thus increase their market share and competitiveness.
Highlights
In recent years, the Latvian higher educational institutions (HEIs) have been facing increasingly complex challenges
The results show the prospective students’ plans to enter HEI significantly correlated (p < 0.01) with cultural, social, psychological, and organizational factors and subsequently all factors were included in the regression analysis
Even though the organizational factors did not display a high proportion of the variance of the dependent variable, this group significantly correlated to the plans of prospective students to enter HEI, and shows that prospective students consider various organization attributes of the HEIs such as geographic location, scholarship opportunities, student life, and others that are similar
Summary
The Latvian higher educational institutions (HEIs) have been facing increasingly complex challenges. Their operating environment is undergoing major transformation caused by changes in demand patterns, decline of government funding, and intensifying global and local competition. A recent increase in foreign student inflow to Latvian’s educational system (68% over the last five years), to a certain extent, offsets this situation, but does not diminish the importance of attracting local students. Another reason for decline in number of prospective students relates to the recent economic trends in Latvia. 62.8% of school leavers pursue higher education, but this may decrease in the future
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