Vietnamese teachers are being overloaded (because of non-teaching tasks), while they have little extra training (from their employers), and Vietnam’s education system (both learners and teachers) need more autonomy to adapt to the new era, said many experts at the Vietnam Forbes Conference 2019 on education in Ho Chi Minh City on October 10. Dr. Nguyen Chi Hieu, CEO at IEG Institute, blamed that teachers currently have to spend 70% of their time to make reports and reply to questions from learners’ parents. As a result, teachers have no spare time to enhance their skills and knowledge, leading to a sustainable downtrend of teachers’ quality. This is a serious problem, he added, explaining that teachers’ roles play at least 70% of the success of learners. He also criticized that many schools are hesitating to spend VND200 million-VND300 million ($8,583-$12,875) on annually improving their teachers, but willing to spend VND2 billion on advertisement. Mr. Hieu listed another problem that Vietnam’s curriculum is focusing too much on knowledge and not enough on skills and characteristics. Regarding solutions, Dr. Le Truong Tung, president of FPT University, suggested Vietnam should improve private education, approach public-private-partnership model, increase tuition fees at public universities. He noted issues that private education is overwhelmed by public education, as public education units are employing 98% of learners. Besides, Mr. Nguyen Quoc Toan, co-founder and CEO of EQuest Group, said that Vietnam should give more autonomy to teachers. Echoing the idea, Mr. Giap Van Duong, co-founder of Vietschool System, suggested Vietnam should approach open education. (Nguoi Lao Dong, CafeF, Tuoi Tre, news.zing, Nguoi Lao Dong)
