VietNamNet Bridge – The application for leaving school written by a 10th grader has become the hot topic on education forums. It is believed to truly reflect the current situation of the Vietnamese education.

The student who wrote the application is Tran Van M, a 10th grader. The student seemed to try to follow all necessary steps when writing an application. There were the country name, epigram, heading, dates and the content.

M wrote that he thought he should write the application to ask for the permission to leave school, because he always plays during lessons and he has weak learning ability. His bad learning record has badly affected the scholastic achievements of the whole class and made teachers heavy hearted. He thinks that he does not deserve to be a student of the school any more.

This is for the first time a student writes an application for leaving school. He has honestly admitted that he learned badly and made a lot of mistakes, therefore, it would be better if he leave school, so as to avoid creating adverse effects to the classmates and the school. The sense of shame has prompted the student to do something to escape the situation.

However, the most noteworthy thing in the application of M was that there were too many spelling mistakes. There were 14 spelling mistakes in a short paragraph, not including the mistakes in literary style.

These are the simple mistakes that M should not have made. Vietnamese students need to read and write fluently after they finish the first grade. No one could imagine that a 10th grade student, who is to finish general school after three years, still cannot write an application.

In Vietnam, M, like many other students, are called "the students who sit in the wrong classes.” With their actual learning ability and knowledge, they should attend lower grades. However, they still can move up to the next grade every year, and though going to class everyday, they cannot receive the knowledge designed for high graders.

M and similar students are believed to be the "products” of the education which has suffered from the so called "achievement disease”, a term used to say about the biggest problem now in the education sector. Schools all report high learning achievements of their students, while in fact, the capability of the students is much lower than reported.

The problem of "sitting in wrong classes” once was the hot topic on education forum in 2006-2007, when the Ministry of Education and Training launched the movement of "saying ‘no’ to exam cheating and the achievement disease in education”. At that time, a lot of students were found as having the academic standard not high enough to follow the grades they were in.

A paradox exists that while a lot of students were found as having bad learning capability, they still could pass the final exams.

Thanh nien newspaper some months ago reported that a lot of 10th graders in Nam Tra My district of Quang Nam province could not solve the mathematics questions designed for third graders. Meanwhile, the schools in the localities had nearly 100 percent of students passing the finals in the 2010-2011 academic year.

An inspection tour was then made at the Nam Tra My High School, which found out that most of the 10th graders at the school were weak at all subjects. Only 5-6 students got 5-6/10 marks (average marks) from the tests they attended before starting the new academic year.

The board of management of the Nam Tra My High School then admitted that 10 percent of 10th graders cannot give answers to the mathematics question "4:2=?”.

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VietNamNet Bridge – It’s very difficult for English teachers to meet the international standards, and it would be not easy for the Ministry of Education and Training to standardize the English teaching staff. Meanwhile, experts believe that meeting international standards should not be an imperative requirement.

English teachers also have to learn English

Hong Hanh, an English teacher of the Cat Linh Primary School in Hanoi, has been recognized as meeting the B2 standard after following the 3-month intensive training course organized by the Hanoi Education and Training Department (HETD).

Hanh said she is one of the luckiest teachers who passed the English skill test. She attended a lot of training courses to improve the knowledge, including overseas ones.

Therefore, Hanh had met B1 standard before going to the HETD’s training course. After the course, where she made a lot of exertion, Hanh and some other colleagues have met the B2 standard.

An English teacher at a high school in HCM City said that it would be not too difficult for primary and secondary school teachers to obtain FCE (First Certificate in English) of the Cambridge University, which is equal to 6.0 IELTS. However, it would be a difficult task for high school teachers, especially the old ones, to obtain 7.5 IELTS.

It would be not a big problem for the teachers who have just finished university education. Meanwhile, the old teachers, who have lost some knowledge over the last many years, would find it difficult to review lessons for attending exams.

Dung, a teacher of the Thanh Cong B Primary School in Hanoi, said she has been teaching English for the last 20 years, during which she attended a lot of training courses. However, she admitted that she would have to learn very hard to have B1 degree.

A primary school teacher in HCM City said she feels worried stiff about the upcoming exam to obtain FCE, because the knowledge she received at school proves to be not enough for English communication.

Is it necessary for teachers to meet international standards?

This is the question raised by Hoang Ngoc Hung, a teacher of the High School for Talented Students under the HCM City National University.

Analysts have also agreed with Hung that the goals of the foreign language teaching program by 2020 prove to be overly high, while the conditions for teaching English in Vietnam remain very poor.

The teachers and students in rural and remote areas are also required to speak standard English, while they may not have any opportunity to meet and talk to any foreigners in their lives. Should they be required to have standard English?

"I think the goals of the program are far away and they seem to be a little bit luxurious in the Vietnamese conditions,” he said.

He believes that in order to upgrade the teachers’ English skills, it would be better to follow a long term plan to improve the situation step by step, instead of providing crash training to teachers, thus putting them under a hard pressure.

The list of the lecturers who still cannot meet B2 and C1 standards has been posted on the website of a faculty of the Hanoi National University. Fifteen out of the 27 lecturers who attended the English skill test on May 28, 2011, could not meet the B2 and C1 standards.

So, is it necessary to require general school teachers to meet international standards, while the lecturers, who once trained the teachers, still cannot meet the standards themselves?

Nguyen Hien

About 300 universities nationwide have made public the exam marks. However, according to the Ministry of Education and Training, only 30 percent of examinees pass the university entrance exams, while the other 70 percent do not have the opportunities to follow university education.

According to Tri Thuc Tre journal, Vietnam is the country which has the highest percentage of students failing the university entrance exams. In the thoughts of many Vietnamese parents and students, following university education is the best way to make their way in the world. Therefore, they feel shameful when they fail the exams or even commit suicide when the doors to universities close before them.

In early July 2010, NTH, 18, in Lam Ha district of Lam Dong province, drank herbicide to commit suicide, because she did not receive the notification about the university entrance exams.

Prior to that, in late 2009, Nguyen Thi V in Con Cuong district of Nghe An province, committed suicide by eating la ngon (Gelsemium elegans) because she was too disappointed about the exam result.

In 2006, Nguyen Thi Dieu T in Nam Dinh province, hung herself after realizing that she failed the university entrance exams.

Recently, in the 2011-2012 exam season, a student tried to commit suicide with the intention to jump to the ground at Lomonosov school after she was asked to leave the exam room because of the exam regulation violation.

Cong Thien, a doctor of the National Mental Health Institute, said that the months after universities make the exam results public are always the busiest time for the institute because of the sharp increase of patients.

Thien has affirmed that suffering depression or mental disorder phenomena due to hard pressure from exams has become alarming.

The value of life measured by the exam marks?

Psychologists say that in the thoughts of the young people who committed suicide because of the exam failure, the value of life is measured by the exam marks.

The problem here is the students’ misunderstanding about the life value, which is believed to be generated by the "achievement disease” prevalent in Vietnam’s education.

Students are always told that they have to obtain high marks and follow university education, if they want to make success in their lives.

At home, parents tell their children that passing the university entrance exams is a must. At school, teachers tell their children to exactly follow the ways they want. Students only have 12 years to fulfill the dream of their parents and become excellent students as they are told to do.

Therefore, a lot of students seem to have only one way to follow when they fail the exams: committing suicide to hide themselves from the shame they cause to themselves and their families.

Psychologists have rung the alarm bell over the increasingly high number of students committing suicide in the last few years, saying that the figure shows that Vietnamese students feel puzzled when they try to escape crisis and stress.

Every year, when publishing the names of excellent students who come first at the entrance exams to schools, local newspapers also report a lot of cases, where students commit suicide just because they fail the exams.

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