Private tutoring is booming across poorer parts of Asia

Private tutoring is well known as an East Asian phenomenon. Apart from in China, most students in East Asia get it: 72% in Hong Kong; 79% at South Korea’s hagwons; 52% of lower-secondary schoolers, Japan’s main test-crammers, in the country’s juku. In China, where 38% of students (and 45% in cities) took private tutoring before a 2021 clampdown, many centres have simply gone underground. These businesses, whatever their flaws, exist alongside education systems that are highly effective and well-funded.