Factors Influencing Students’ Choice of High Education Studies in Tanzania

Abstract

The study sought to explore the factors influencing Bachelor of Business Administration students' choice of higher education studies; higher education helps an individual to develop as well as society at large. The expansion of high education in Tanzania has spread all over the country through the creation of new public and private higher education institutions, as well as the creation of internal and external scholarships, which have been some of the policies aimed at increasing access to high education, especially the increase in students’ access to high education. This has made it great decision-making for a student to select or choose a university to pursue his or her high education. The researcher aimed to explore the factors that influence students to choose a particular high education institution to pursue their high education studies. This study had three specific objectives, which were to investigate the effects of the location of a university on students' choice, to explore the effects of reputation on students' choice, and to explore the effects of past performance on students' choice of the university. The objectives were met through valid survey questionnaires and interviews. The study adopted a mixed approach by combining qualitative and quantitative approaches. The result showed that the location of the university, intrinsic factors (self-interest of the student) for the university to study, the reputation factor of the high education institute, past performance of the university, and political factors attracted students to select the university to study. Institutes may use the above factors to trace strategies to provide more course varieties.