June-06-2008
VietNamNet
Written by Lan Huong

The ‘advanced syllabuses’ being implemented in 13 key universities in Vietnam are expected to become models for Vietnam’s education. However, students have said, after only three years, that they are disappointed with the project.

Model for Vietnam’s education?

At the workshop reviewing the implementation of ’advanced syllabuses’

In 2006, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) began carrying out 10 advanced syllabuses at nine key universities on a trial basis. And now the advanced syllabuses are being provided in 13 universities nationwide.

“The biggest problems now for Vietnam’s education are lack of lecturers, lack of quality textbooks, and lack of international-standard syllabuses,” said Nguyen Thien Nhan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education and Training, emphasising that the advanced syllabuses were expected to become the model for Vietnam’s education, because they can settle the problems.

Unlike other syllabuses designed for talented students or high-quality syllabuses, the ‘advanced syllabuses’ are entirely imported from prestigious universities around the world, including their curricula, training plans, education management. Most importantly, lecturers give lectures to students in English.

The state pays VND860bil or 60% of the total expenses for the first three courses under the ‘advanced syllabuses’, while universities spend 25%, and the other 15% comes from tuition and other sources.

MOET hopes that it can build up and develop several study branches into internationally-recognised ones in the region and in the world. It believes that the model will help Vietnam build prestigious universities, and that Vietnam will have universities listed among the top 200 universities in the world by 2020.

Nevertheless, the advanced syllabuses have not attracted students. The number of students in 2007 saw considerable decreases over the previous year in the study branches of physics, energy systems and plantation sciences.

Vietnamese students prefer following courses provided by domestic universities in association with foreign universities which can give them international degrees than following the ‘advanced syllabuses’, which give Vietnamese degrees.

In addition, the strict requirements set for selecting students for the advanced syllabuses (high scores on the entrance exams and fluent English skills) have also been cited as a reason that not many students like the advanced syllabuses.

The students that follow advanced syllabuses also have to pay the tuition of several hundred dollars a year, much higher than the tuition for other normal programmes.

Teaching by ‘reading and writing down’?

Students from the Hanoi University of Technology said that these are the ‘advanced syllabuses’, but they really are not advanced. The syllabuses have been described as the ‘foreign curricula with Vietnamese teaching way of reading and writing down’, which means lecturers read lectures and students do only one thing – write them down.

In fact, many lecturers cannot speak English fluently; therefore they have limitations. In some cases, lecturers just give lectures in Vietnamese.

Meanwhile, Vietnamese students, due to limited skills in English, are receiving knowledge from lecturers in a passive way. They dare not raise questions and join in discussions in the classes. Some students cannot do exercises because they don’t have computers with Internet.

Meanwhile, Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Thien Nhan said that the universities that provide advanced syllabuses must have enough lecturers who have doctorate degrees and suitable teaching methods. If they don’t have enough qualified lecturers, they have to hire lecturers from other universities. And if they cannot hire lecturers from other universities, they have to invite foreign lecturers.

Nhan said that lecturers must pass tests and their English must be assessed by a council of MOET and foreign experts.

To date, only six Vietnamese universities have invited lecturers from foreign partner universities to give lectures at their universities. Meanwhile, Deputy Minister of MOET Banh Tien Long said that every year, universities must have at least 20-30% of subjects taught by foreign lecturers.

Do Phuc, Dean of the Information System Faculty of the Information Technology University under the HCM City National University, said that it is necessary to form a community of foreign lecturers, who can be invited to give lecturers at many universities.

Another problem students complain about is the expensive textbooks for training courses. Nhan has asked universities to purchase old textbooks for students. Currently, universities have to buy textbooks through distributors at prices several times more expensive than original prices. The Irrigation University has purchased textbooks on Amazon.com, spending VND3bil ($187,500).