"Your parents are so evil-starred because they have such a cheeky son like you”, "You are so ill-bred”, "Why cannot you open your eyes to what I teach you?” – the words were uttered from a teacher, who, at the same time, slapped students repeatedly on their faces. These scenes were seen in a 3-minute video clip filmed secretly in a classroom in Hanoi showing four male students standing before the class and getting a ruthless scolding from a teacher. The video clip has raised anger among netizens, who commented that the slang words must not be used by a teacher, especially when he was at school. The teacher is Nguyen Dinh T, 27, of the Bac Giang-based Dong Kinh people founded High School at a school’s branch in Hanoi. L, the manager of the branch, affirmed that beating students must not be the education method applied at school. 

"Teacher T lost his temper at that moment and committed such a ruthless behavior,” L said. "We on January 11, 2014, asked the teacher to stop teaching for two weeks and report the details of the case to the board of management.” However, the school’s board of management highly appreciates the qualification and the morality of the teacher. L said the teacher has been working there for four years as a good chemistry teacher. His students have always been leading the school with high learning achievements. A colleague of teacher T at the same school said T is beloved by students, who call him "mother T”, because the teacher has been close and attached to students. The teacher reportedly feeds, clothes and teaches five students at his home. Why did the qualified and beloved teacher make such ruthless behavior to students? The teacher said that some students made noise at a lesson on January 10 and they ignored the warning of the teacher. Therefore, he lost his temper and heaped the insults on the students. In another clip, posted on Internet some days ago, a teacher was seen slapping a student in black shirt repeatedly on his face. 

Another male student came closer to the teacher and asked: "Why did you hit him so violently?” 

When the teacher tried to hit the other student on the face, the student fought back to the teacher. The fight was stopped by some students who dissuaded the student from beating the teacher. However, he still shouted: "Do we pay money to you to get slaps from you?” 

The images in the video clip and the voice of the portraits made people believe that the thing happened at a high school in Phu Phong town, Tay Son district of Binh Dinh province. 

Educators recently have continuously complained about the increasingly serious school violence. 

Prior to that, a teacher of the Hang Hai High School in Hai Phong City, in late 2012 was disciplined for her cursing at students. 

Chi Mai

HCMC – Don ca tai tu, a genre of folk music popular in southern Vietnam, has been recognized by UNESCO as an intangible cultural heritage of humanity. Katherine Muller-Marin, representative of UNESCO in Vietnam and head of UNESCO Office in Hanoi, handed an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity certificate for Don ca tai tu to Vietnam at a ceremony held last night at HCMC’s Reunification Palace. 

During the ceremony, organized by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, artists from 21 provinces and cities nationwide performed this folk music to entertain audiences. 

The ministry announced a national action plan to protect and develop this art as pledged with UNESCO. 

Don ca tai tu has been present in the southern part of the country for over 100 years with many historical vicissitudes. Therefore, the urgent task is to promote its values and transfer it to the younger generation, according to Dang Thi Bich Lien, Deputy Minister of Culture, Sports and Tourism. 

UNESCO earlier recognized seven other genres of traditional music including "Nha nhac Hue” (royal court music), "Quan ho” (folk music in Bac Ninh and Bac Giang provinces) and "Ca tru” (northern ceremonial singing) as intangible cultural world heritage.

The majority of the working English teachers have been found as unable to meet the international standards. This has raised a worry that the national English teaching program may fail completely. 

However, analysts commented that the bad qualifications of English teachers are not a surprise at all. The English teachers are the "products” of the unreasonable English teaching mechanism. 

Nguyen The Quyet, Headmaster of Tran Cao Van Primary School in Da Nang City, said that students at foreign language schools can only practice reading and writing, therefore, it is understandable why they are bad at listening and speaking. Quyet, when citing a series of reasons to explain the low qualifications of English teachers, stressed that English teachers graduate from different schools, including non-foreign language schools. However, they, for some reasons, still decided to become English teachers at general schools. Doan Thi Minh Cong, Deputy Director of the Hai Duong provincial Education and Training Department, also said that the qualifications of English teachers vary, depending on their "origin.” In many cases, primary schools’ English teachers graduated from in-service or distance training courses, the types of training which are believed to provide low training quality. Cong also said that English teachers at general schools meet problems in upgrading their English. They don’t have the opportunities to meet foreigners or attend overseas training courses to practice English. 

An English teacher from a primary school in Hanoi, who asked to be anonymous, said that the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) has set up unreasonable demands when requiring English teachers to meet the international standards. She said that MOET should not set such high requirements until it can provide favorable conditions to teachers to study and upgrade their qualifications and give them the salaries good enough. 

A lot of teachers now don’t get salaries from the State budget, but from the schools which hire them under the short term labor contracts. This means that they have been living on the modest incomes and have not been recognized as the regular members of schools’ personnel. 

Nguyen Hoai Chuong, Deputy Director of the HCM City Education and Training Department, said it is necessary to reconsider the entire training process at all education levels. 

He stressed that the first thing that needs to be done to fulfill the national English teaching program is to upgrade the existing English teachers’ qualifications, because only good teachers can create good products. 

The substandard teachers in HCM City still can continue their works at schools while they have attend refresher courses to upgrade their qualifications. If they still cannot meet the requirements after the re-training, they would have to leave to undertake other jobs. Tran Van Dung from the Thua Thien – Hue provincial education and training department said from now on, only the teachers who meet the requirements, will be employed in the locality. However, he is afraid that with the current teaching method, learners would not be able to meet the standards. And this will be a great waste of money and time. 

Tien Phong