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13/09/2013

On August 22nd and 23th 2013, VVOB Vietnam joined hands with national and international partners within the Vietnamese education sector to organise a national symposium on Education Quality. "Towards a Learning Society: Supporting Teaching and Learning in Vietnam" welcomed national and international speakers and participants. Vice Minister Nguyen Vinh Hien honoured the organising committee by providing opening and closing remarks. The objective was to share lessons learnt and best practices of promoting quality of education. Together they provided policy recommendations on further enhancement of education quality in Vietnam.

Reaching out

"We are happy to receive so many Vietnamese and non-Vietnamese participants from all over this vast country and abroad to this symposium", say Dr Hoang Duc Minh (Ministry of Education and Training) and Dr Wilfried Theunis (VVOB). "We are especially happy for the support and are honoured by the participation of our distinguished Vice Minister of Education and Training, the honourable Vice Minister Nguyen Vinh Hien, who introduced and closed this symposium."

The symposium reached a variety of international and local policy makers; education managers; lecturers; teachers; researchers; representatives of political, social, professional and mass organisations; as well as development partners. These education sector stakeholders shared lessons learnt and best practices of promoting quality of education. In their conclusions, they provided policy recommendations on further enhancement of education quality in Vietnam.

Additionally, 46 journalists representing 28 newspapers, five television stations and one radio station attended the event (some examples on the YouTube channel of VVOB Vietnam).

Education quality: a multidimensional concept

At the symposium, 50 presentations covered different aspects of quality of education through four perspectives: students, teachers, managers, and parents and communities. National keynote speaker was Mr Pham Do Nhat Tien, former assistant of the Minister of Education and Training in Vietnam. Mrs Ushio Miura, programme specialist of the Regional Bureau for Education in Asia and the Pacific of UNESCO in Bangkok, delivered the regional keynote. Both speakers considered education quality as a multidimensional concept that needs to be addressed through a systemic approach with comprehensive education policies.

Key findings and policy recommendations

Based on the thematic sessions, key findings and policy recommendations were formulated in each of the four covered perspectives. These thematic outcomes include:

  • promote students' activeness and autonomy, focus on self-learning, problem-solving and creative thinking skills while ensuring support to include vulnerable and disadvantaged students in their learning;
  • enhance teacher training and professional development through: development of communities of practice, action research, use of ICT, pedagogical innovation, development of professional sharing meetings, improve link between student teachers and schools through increased and earlier practice time, support teachers in delivering rights-based inclusive education, and address non-formal learning needs in teacher training;
  • enhance education management through: innovations of in-service training towards modernisation and relevance, improvement of monitoring and evaluation towards supporting disadvantaged students in accessing education, and application of research on theories as well as on good practices towards innovation of managing professional development;
  • improve links among family, society and schools as well as resources for supporting parenting skills, enhanced community-based activities and more diversification of content and modalities of community-based education services in line with local contexts and needs.

Reflections

Following the thematic debriefing during a panel discussion, H.E. Mr Nguyen Vinh Hien summarised his final reflections and provided additional recommendations regarding the enhancement of education quality in Vietnam. Vice Minister Hien emphasised:

  • students need to become all-round citizens that can support the development of the country, therefore the education system needs to emphasise the development of students’ competencies and their self-learning capacity, reflected in textbooks with room for creativity and with specific attention to the needs of disadvantaged children;
  • teachers need incentives to learn continuously and update their skills, which will be emphasised in a compensation and remuneration scheme as part of the new project for education reform, need to interact with communities and need more practice in pre-service, while for in-service teacher training, the first e-learning courses have been uploaded as an important instrument to enhance efficiency and effectiveness of teacher professional development;
  • education managers need to take up their decentralised autonomy and leadership role with a focus on quality assurance;
  • and schools need to take up their role as a bridge between family as first education environment and society, while parenting education plays an important role and community learning can be better consolidated at local level.

Vice Minister Hien also confirmed that the key findings and recommendations will reach the Education Reform Committee. More specific ideas from the symposium will be taken up with the respective functional departments of the Ministry of Education and Training. As a follow-up, VVOB Vietnam and its partners will jointly submit all key findings and policy recommendations to the MOET leadership.

This successful two-day symposium was the result of a cooperation of: national education sector partners (Ministry of Education and Training - including the Department of Teachers and Educational Administrators-, National Institute for Education Management, Vietnam National Institute of Educational Sciences, Hanoi National University of Education), UNESCO, Non-Governmental Organisations (ChildFund, Oxfam GB, Plan International, Vietnam Coalition For Education For All) and VVOB.