he population of Bangladesh is increasing very rapidly. Compare to the number of universities available, number of students is huge. So to get an admission in reputed university is getting tougher day by day. The public universities in Bangladesh can accommodate a very scanty number of students. So a good number of students have to choose private university as their center for higher education. This particular study will help to find out which are the factors that students consider or evaluate for choosing a university for higher education in Bangladesh.

? To find out the factors that students evaluate before admitting for higher education in university level ? To identify the most significant factor(s) that attract students for choosing university III.

Once the research objectives are set the next logical step to achieve those objectives is to decide the methodology to be followed. This study has been done based on primary and secondary sources of data and information. Structured questionnaire and interview method were used to collect the primary data. Secondary data were collected from different local and international articles and journals, books, and websites.

The study has made an endeavor to find out the factors contributing towards the choice of universities by the students in Bangladesh. A specifically designed questionnaire was used as a tool and the survey covered a sample of 60 participants who were the students of various universities in Bangladesh. The fivepoint Likert scale ranging from 1 -strongly disagree to 5 -strongly agree was used for the questions to indicate the degree of agreement or disagreement with each of a series of statements related to the stimulus objects of the study. Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) 21 was used as a statistical analysis tool.

The questionnaire was self-administered and distributed among the sixty respondents. Before giving the questionnaires, all the questions were explained to the participants so that they can easily complete the whole questionnaire. It was difficult to distribute the questionnaire to a large number of respondents due to time constraints, lack of resources, and budget. Therefore, convenient sampling method was used.

The research questions that were used to construct investigative questions in order to satisfactorily arrive at a conclusion about the study are: ? What are the factors that students consider for choosing university? Based on the research questions, the following hypotheses have been articulated. H1: Reputation is the most important factor for choosing a university. H2: Tuition Fees is the most important factor for choosing a university. H3: Location is the most important factor for choosing a university. H4: Permanent Campus is the most important factor for choosing a university. H5: Teachers' Quality is the most important factor for choosing a university. H6: Online Service is the most important factor for choosing a university. H7: IT Facility is the most important factor for choosing a university. H8: Advertisement is the most important factor for choosing a university. H9: Environment is the most important factor for choosing a university.

Choosing a higher education institute is very important decision for a student because higher study has the potential to change a person's life (Kusumawati, Yanamandram and Perera, 2010). Choosing a particular university is important factor by respondents for higher education (Shahid, Shafique and Bodla, 2012). Several researchers developed many models in this respect. Most studies that have tried to understand the university choice process could be included in one of the following categories: economic models, status-attainment models and combined models (Hossler, Schmidt and Vesper, 1999). The economic model can also refer as the human capital investment model. It assumes that students will choose a particular institute because of greater benefits compared to others. The sociological model covers various individual and social factors (Calhoun, 1982). In the combined model, the factors in both economic and sociological factors are taken into considerations when explaining students' choice of higher education institution.

A lot of criteria can work in choosing higher education institutions. Some researches show the importance of parents' decision on students' choice (Moogan and Baron, 2003;Domino, Libraire, Lutwiller et al., 2006;Yamamoto, 2006;Raposo and Alves, 2007;Al-Yousef, 2009). It is also found that a student's choice can be affected by their siblings, friends, peers, relatives, teachers and other influential people (Ceja, 2004;Ceja, 2006;Yamamoto, 2006;Pimpa and Suwannapirom, 2008;Wagner and Fard, 2009). Some researchers consider geographic location as an important factor as well as institutional characteristics include teaching quality, prestige, infrastructure, library, computer facilities, location, quality of the curricula, scientific research quality, administrative support, extracurricular factors (sports, leisure, canteens etc.) and the availability of exchanging programs with foreign universities ( , 2006). Financial aid or packages that include scholarships and grants increase the acceptability of a higher education institution (Kim, 2004;Govan et al., 2006;Hoyt and Brown, 2003). Future studies should take the limitations of this research paper into consideration at the design stage, so that research can be improved and accuracy further increased.

V. a. The value is negative due to a negative average covariance among items. This violates reliability model assumptions. Interpretation 4 items were selected for measuring the dependent variable and after conducting the reliability analysis for these items, the Alpha value was found -.185, which means that, there is an internal inconsistency of -18.5% among the 4 items. But after deleting the weak two factors, internal consistency was found 31.7% among the 4 items.

To measure the dependent and independent variable, 22 items were used. Among those, 4 items were developed for measuring the dependent variable and rest of the 18 items were developed for measuring independent variable. 9 independent variables were used in the research. The number of independent variables and the respective items to measure them is given below- After conducting the reliability test for the independent variables, the alpha values that were found for each of the independent variable is provided below in another table- Alpha value of lower than 0.50 is not good but there are some variables that have higher alpha values which are good. So, there is mixed variables.

Before conducting the regression analysis, mean values for the consistent items of the dependent and independent variables were identified. Then, the regression analysis was conducted by taking the mean values of the dependent variable and 9 independent variables. The result of regression analysis is placed below.

Volume XVI Issue XI Version I Year ( ) From the table, it is seen that Reputation has a positive effect on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is positive (.215) and the effect of Reputation is significant as the P value is .206, the null hypothesis is rejected.

2. H0: Tuition Fees is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: Tuition Fees is the most important factor for choosing a university.

It is seen that Tuition Fees has a positive impact on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is positive (.022) and the effect of Tuition Fees doesn't have significance as the P value is .324, the null hypothesis is accepted. Assessing the Factors behind Choosing Universities for Higher Education: A Case of Bangladesh Table 7 Table 8 3. H0: Location is not the most important factor for choosing a university.

H1: Location is the most important factor for choosing a university.

From the above table, it is seen that Permanent campus has a negative effect on Factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is negative (-.141) and P value is .520, the null hypothesis is accepted. So, Permanent campus is not the most important factor for choosing a university. 5. H0: Teachers' Quality is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: Teachers' Quality is the most important factor for choosing a university.

It is seen that Teachers' Quality has a positive effect on Factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is positive (.098) the P value is .564, null hypothesis is accepted. It means Teachers' Quality is not the most important factor for choosing a university.

6. H0: Online service is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: Online service is the most important factor for choosing a university.

It is seen that online service has a positive effect on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. As the beta value is positive (.309) and P value is .095, the null hypothesis is rejected. It means online service is the most important factor for choosing a university. 7. H0: IT facility is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: IT facility is the most important factor for choosing a university.

It is seen that IT facility has a negative effect on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is negative (-.197) and P value is .403, the null hypothesis is accepted. It means IT facility is not the most important factor for choosing a university. From the table, it is revealed that Location has a negative effect on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is negative (-.072) and the effect of Location doesn't have significant impact as the P value is .669, the null hypothesis is accepted. It means Location is not the most important factor for choosing a university. 4. H0: Permanent campus is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: Permanent campus is the most important factor for choosing a university.

Table 9 Table 10 Table 11 Table 12 Table 13 Table 14 It is seen that Advertisement has a positive impact on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. As the beta value is positive (.055) and P value is .728, the null hypothesis is accepted. It means Advertisement is not the most important factor for choosing a university. 9. H0: Environment is not the most important factor for choosing a university. H1: Environment is the most important factor for choosing a university.

It is seen that Environment has a negative effect on factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. Since the beta value is negative (-.197) and P value is .403, the null hypothesis is accepted. Hence, Environment is not the most important factor for choosing a university.

The R 2 value is 76.1% which states that the independent variables explain the dependent variable in a high manner. After conducting the regression analysis, it is found that Reputation and Online Service are the most important factors behind choosing universities for higher education in Bangladesh. There are also some extraneous factors which affect the students' choice of universities for higher education in Bangladesh.

Universities are playing a pivotal role in the educational process of Bangladesh. The university selection criteria may vary among the students. But reputation of the university and available online service are the two main influencing factors that play the most vital role in choosing universities for higher education.

It is recommended that universities should focus more on their reputation and online service to enhance students' preference.

It is acknowledged that the work here is exploratory study because previously no study was done in this context in Bangladesh. The present study is conducted among the students at various universities in Dhaka city. So, the sample size was small. The survey took some time due to personal visits. Time constraints and costs are also the limitations of this study. The current study directs future researchers to increase sample size and conduct longitudinal study that could provide a better insight by identifying and testing the significance of extraneous factors.