By Reggie J

OUR obsession with education has created a two-tiered entry to society, anointing some for admission to the club of top performers and labelling the rest as second best.

Is it any wonder then that tuition, in any form, is such big business and fiercely competitive here?

Private tutors do not have to be registered by the Ministry of Education (MOE) as they provide tuition in private residences. But tuition agencies that run classroom-style sessions do. Kumon, as an enrichment learning centre, also needs no MOE approval.

I remember when private tutors were teachers, ex-teachers, retired teachers and academics. Today, most private tutors are undergraduates who moonlight.

Here's the big mystery: Why is a nation obsessed with education incapable of finding a way to accredit private tutors? Perhaps teachers cannot cope and don't have the time to reach and teach all.

One parent told me that the principal of her son's school told her if her son has tuition, he will get the one-on-one attention he deserves. But with hourly fees ranging anywhere from $40 to $90, tuition does not come cheap.

My check revealed no fewer than 30 companies offering private tuition. TutorAdvisor has some 25,000 tutors on its books.

It is difficult to even guess how many private tutors there are here. Some say it could be 60,000, but many are part-timers.

In the heartlands, there are couples who have given up teaching, converted two rooms of their HDB flat into classrooms and earn no less than $18,000 per month for long fruitful hours. Ang Mo Kio, Bishan and Tampines have the biggest number of tutors, not surprisingly.

Language private tutors in Malay and Chinese earn around $8,000 per month, reportedly.

Thinking out loud, it seems somewhat surprising that NTUC, which has touched so many facets of our lives, has not got into the lucrative tuition business.

The popular subjects taught by private tutors are Maths, English, Science and Chinese. Private tuition, like it or loathe it, is now our way of life.

So let's regulate it better and foster the creation of cheaper alternatives one way or another.

One parent, who says his two children are bright, insisted on private tuition because the other children in the block have it; he felt he would be depriving his children otherwise.

Depriving the kids? All these years, I thought I was deprived for not getting that Meccano set for my 10th birthday!

• The writer is a former Singaporean marketing professional

This article was first published in The New Paper on Sept 12, 2008.