A report by the National Sample Survey Office (NSSO) revealed that 20 percent of Indians pursuing degree courses and 13 percent pursuing post-graduate courses and above avail private tuition. Tutoring as an industry is estimated to be $11 billion, growing 11–12 percent year on year and is expected to touch $16 billion by 2017.
India has 100 million students in private schools with a shortage of two million teachers. Addressing the needs of the current generation students can be a huge business opportunity. Come online tutoring, a nascent market that companies need to build an integrated and scalable model for.
Students from primary classes to Class XII are now actively leveraging websites and apps in their search for excellent tutors. In the last few years, the approach of the parent, teacher, and student fraternity in India has been veering towards the online world, especially in urban and semi-urban India. A handful of startups rode high on this behavioural change and succeeded in the online tutoring domain.
Retention rates of Students & Teachers in different Online Platforms:
- Vedantu has more than 35000 registered students with a retention rate of 80%.
- Brainnr has more than 1600 students and 40 teachers with 80% tutor retention rate.
- Eduwizards has close to 100,000 registered students and 25000 tutors in India.
Experts Speak:
Initiatives like Digital India and fast growing Internet infrastructure provide platforms like Vedantu with tools to connect more students and teachers facilitating effective learning. Vedantu, one such startup connecting a student directly to a teacher makes sure learning-teaching happens in a personalised way. Vamsi Krishna, Co-founder and CEO, Vedantu, says, “Vedantu as a one-to-one online tutoring platform has only personalisation for the student as its core mission. It aims at creating a platform where the student will be at the center of learning. Where a teacher will teach according to the need, pace and level of a student. Where learning graduates from One-to-Many to 1-to-1. Where accessibility will no longer be a challenge as the student can get the best.”
Factors in favour of Online Tutoring:
- Good Tutor Management platform
- Robust Training
- Monitoring of tutors remotely
- Usage of Artificial Intelligence
Where does the future lie?
Talking about the future of online tutoring, Mr. Krishna says, “While it will take some more time for the complete switch to take place, we believe online tutoring is the way forward for students and parents looking for personal attention. Classroom coaching may work for some students, but, there will be others who need special attention or more help on particular areas – this is where a platform like Vedantu will play a key role, by mentoring them 1-1 and solving all their queries real time. We believe that choice and convenience will drive this trend of online tutoring over traditional classes but as with e-commerce it’s not that the whole behavior will shift online. In fact we see both the models co-existing.”
Online videos of a tutor teaching either live or as a pre-recorded package, and online marketplace for tutors collectively form the online tutoring market. The supplementary education market in India for school students is estimated to be close to $25 billion and is expected to touch $30 billion by 2020. Live online tutoring constitutes less than one percent of this market but is expected to grow significantly with the increased intervention of technology.
