Factors affecting student’s intention to persist with study: research of Vietnamese private universities

Over the past decade, high dropping rates have become a prevalent and publicly recognised challenge for universities in Vietnam. They have led to more significant concerns about higher education service quality. Ample evidence shows that professional service delivery appears reasonable since potential benefits far outweigh the costs of an increasingly competitive and challenging academic field. Hence, this study seeks to identify factors affecting students' intention to retain students in private universities. Based on this holistic objective, it reports on research examining the influence of tertiary service quality dimensions, which is crucial to gaining student satisfaction and the student intent to persist in targeting Vietnamese private-owned universities. Contemporary research has emphasised the significance of service quality on students' satisfaction and persistence in private higher education institutions. In addition, the recent literature has highlighted a need for further study on service quality dimensions, comprised of academic and non-academic aspects, access, program issues, and reputation. These dimensions of service draw upon the work of Abdullah (2006), known as HedPerf. According to several previous studies, service quality dimensions are essential to trigger positive perceptions, students' satisfaction, persistence, and retention (Alsaggaf & Althonayan 2018). However, minimal research has been done in Vietnamese higher education, especially private universities. Thus, this study investigates these research problems by distributing and collecting 450 structured questionnaires from bachelor's students in three private universities in Vietnam (Hoa Sen University, HUTECH University, and UEF University). The convenient sampling technique is used in the data collection process, and descriptive statistical analysis is used to analyse collected data, along with Anova, Levene's Test, Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA), and Structural Equation Modelling (SEM). In order to generate output, the researcher employed IBM SPSS AMOS software. This study aims to develop a new model for testing the effectiveness of service quality within private higher education in emerging countries on customer-based perspectives by incorporating service quality perception and student satisfaction in comprehensively understanding students' persistence and retention. The outcome of this study was aligned with past research published on HedPerf and students' intent to persist. This study confirmed that the three constructs all have significant relationships. All the service quality dimensions in the HedPerf model reported having a crucial positive influence on students' satisfaction and students' intent to persist. Likewise, the students' satisfaction showed a significant positive link with students' intent to persist. The study has provided various implications from theoretical and managerial perspectives. From a theoretical perspective, this study provides evidence of the relative influence of the factors affecting students' intention to persist. This study is also the first in the Vietnamese Tertiary Marketing Research attempt to construct a framework to identify the most crucial service quality dimensions and examine the relationship among the constructs. In addition, from a managerial perspective, the literature review suggests this study may benefit administrative staff and leaders of universities in Vietnam in having a better understanding of these factors, providing some guidelines for developing effective service quality strategies, and motivating students to be more satisfied re-enrol. From a holistic perspective, these suggestions are believed to be ground. They should be implemented since this research has a considerable influence on supporting the position of the Vietnamese Higher Education sector, which is a step forwards in creating better service quality, higher student satisfaction, and persistence rates. Thus, it might be beneficial to minimise the number of students who intend to withdraw from those who intend to withdraw qualified graduates. However, as there is limited time and financial capability, only a small number of private universities have been chosen. This study can reference future research to investigate service quality, students' satisfaction, and their intentions to persist in their studies in Vietnam's public universities.