Structural relations between factors influencing value in pursuing studies at private vocational schools

Abstract

This study was aimed at investigating the factors influencing value in pursuing studies at private vocational schools and the level of such factors. The sample consisted of 379 students of 53 private vocational schools, which were selected through stratified random sampling. The instrument used for collecting the data was the questionnaire with reliability of 0.987 that consisted of three parts: Part 1 was general data; Part 2 was a 5-level rating scale questionnaire that included the factors influencing value in pursuing study at private vocational schools, and Part 3 was about the means of path analysis technique. The findings revealed that the students' opinion toward the factors influencing value in pursuing studies at private vocational schools was at the high level. All variables of the structural relations within the model had significantly influenced the value in pursuing studies at private vocational schools. The total effects of all variables ranging from maximum to minimum were house or residence, program options, desire to study at private vocational schools, guardian's preference, scholarships, social reputation, tuitions, academic reputation, gender, advertising, GPA, family income, parent's education level, and school choice. The correlation coefficients of 20 manifest variables showed that only 162 pairs from 190 pairs of correlation were statistical significant, and the rest (28 pairs) had no correlation significance. Most coefficients were positively correlated. Only 21 pairs were negatively correlated, and they had the correlation values from −0.005 to −0.777. The correlation of internal manifest variables or the independent variables had correlation coefficients between −0.777 to 0.073. The maximum correlation coefficient of independent variables was the correlation of rank of school choice (RANK) and secondary school GPA (S.GPA). The minimum correlation coefficient of independent variables was the correlation of rank of school choice (RANK) and parents' education level (P.EDU). The correlation coefficients of the external manifest variables or the dependent variables were varied in the range of 0.570 to 0.956. The maximum correlation coefficient of dependent variables were the correlation of economic factor (ECOALL) and desire to study at private vocational schools (DESIREAL), theoretical factor (THE_FAC) and the social factor (SOC_FAC), THE_FAC and environment factor (ENV_FAC) respectively. The minimum correlation coefficient of dependent variables was the correlation of gender (GENDERAL) and advertisement (ADVERALL).