Hi everyone,
On the news today is a creative proposal by Mr. Phạm Minh Hạc, former Minister of Education and Training, that instead of the national high-school-graduation exam, we shoud have this exam handled by each school itself and the school will sign its graduation certificates.
Here is the news:
Hãy ghi tên trường vào bằng tốt nghiệp - (TuanVietNam) - GS Phạm Minh Hạc, nguyên Bộ trưởng Bộ GD và ĐT nêu ý kiến: Cải cách thi cử, trong đó kỳ thi tốt nghiệp THPT thành kỳ kiểm tra cuối cấp do các trường tự tổ chức, trong giấy chứng nhận tốt nghiệp ghi rõ: Học sinh A, đã tốt nghiệp THPT tại trường X, tỉnh Y.
How do think about this proposal? Teachers? Parents? Students?
Have a great day!
Hoanh
What does this has anything to do with the "English Discussion" ... forum?
ReplyDeleteBy the way, it should be "What do you think ..." not " How do think ..."
Dear TTT,
ReplyDeleteThanks for the note, sister/berother.
Could you please analyze why "How do you think about this proposal" is incorrect, and why "What do you think about this proposal" is correct?
If you could do that, then I would tell you which one is right or wrong. And why.
And before you send in your next message, it woud be helpful if you could read this guidelines on Internet communications.
http://dotchuoinon.com/2009/07/08/daily-english-discussion-thursday-july-9-2009/
Thanks a million. Have a great day!
Hoanh
Dear H,
ReplyDeleteI do not agree with the proposal of Mr. Hạc.
The national high-school examination is still necessary for Vietnamese education in at least 20 years later.
As the education quality of Vietnam, in general, is very low, the decision to leave schools handling the final exams by themselves may cause unexpected biased academic result, in compare of the differences between schools in big cities and schools in backward provinces. For example, in HCMC, schools that developed the teaching quality with new information technology and researching may have a different exam in compare with schools in backward areas without much support and information. I think this proposal is the idea being copied from the high-school system of developed country like US. However, it's not applicable to developing countries like VN.
Instead, I think the cancellation of the national uni entrance exam is necessary at the moment. First, after studying very hard for the national high-school final exam, students will need time to relax. Therefore, if students are pushed to another exam after the high school final exam, they may feel tired and bored. The quality of education, without deep consideration toward the students, would fail to achieve the real humanity value of education. Then, the management of the higher education system of VN should make some changing to improve itself. The entrance of University should be opened to everybody as a chance for them to choose the right things in their life. However, the exit of the graduate level should be strictly controlled in order to grant the graduation attempts for only valuable students. By doing this, each graduate will be challenged not just by the university staff but by him/herself as well to grow up and to know what he/she wants to do. As students can study in anywhere they want, there won't be much pressure towards big cities. This would be great advantage for teachers, parents and students as well.
Sincerely,
Stone.
Dear Anh Hoanh,
ReplyDeleteI think that we can not cancel the nation graduation examination, because of our education towards achievement. There are many problems will arise.
The nation university entrance examination should be canceled to open more opportunities for students, they will select the school which is in accordance with them.
Dear H,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your information,
I think you should re-read my response carefully. That's all what I've said.
For Vietnamese education, we made a lot of mistakes, I think. One more mistake won't kill, I guess.
Sincerely,
Stone.
Dear Stone, Binh Duong & everyone,
ReplyDeleteThe more I think about this, the more I think anh Phạm Minh Hạc’s proposal makes sense. Let me a hasten to note here that I understand all the negative issues of Vietnam’s education and I understand Vietnam’s need to uphold high education standards. But please allow me to do some quick analysis here. I think that allowing each school to handle the high school graduation exam may not hurt the quality standards as many may fear, while greatly increasing equality for the poor.
* Let’s face our concern directly: Why do we think that scraping away the national HS graduation exam may lower education quality?
Right now, we have many schools with different levels of quality. Poor areas have low quality, richer areas have higher quality. The current national exam CANNOT change this quality difference, because poor provinces simply do not have good teachers and good facilities. This inequality will be there for many many years and no national exam will change it. It is an economic issue, not an education issue.
If we do away with the national exam, good schools will stay good, because I cannot see any reason why good schools would lower their quality just because there is no national exam.
Indeed, when the school signs its name on the certificate of graduation, it has all the reasons in the world to keep its quality and, therefore, its reputation very high. Schools will have more incentives to work better when their signatures are on the students’ graduation certificates.
* Now let’s assume that, in the worst case scenario, bad schools would NOT improve its quality, but would just graduate lots of students. What is wrong with this? Answer: Many students who wouldn’t have graduated now would graduate high school and might be able to go to college. They might not be good enough to enter good colleges, but they might enter lower-quality colleges.
Good colleges will continue to be good or better. Many lower-quality college will enter the market and open doors for weaker students.
In sum, good students and good schools will continue to be good or better. But we will have many more weak students enter weak schools, and they will have more opportunities in life. That mean, the top quality of the system will not go down; we will have many more weak students entering (weak) colleges. That’s all.
The real benefit of this is: It gives poor students an opportunity to enter colleges. Bad colleges are still better than no college at all. This is equal opportunity.
Right now our society is unfair to the poor and the ethnic minorities. National standards maintain that inequality and unfairness.
This issue is more than education standards. It is about fairness and equality for the poor. Maintaining this kind of imbalance between cities and the countryside is a very good way to breed social and political troubles in the long run. In the end, the real political strength of Vietnam lies in the countryside and the poor. A wise government would want to make sure the poor be treated with equality as much as possible.
If any brother and sister tends to disagree with me, I would ask you to rethink this over. We have to care for ALL our people.
Have a great day!
Hoanh
Dear H,
ReplyDeleteI'd like to ask you a personal question:
If you have children, will you let them study in Vietnamese schools after the high-school final exam is canceled as you wanted? Why and why not?
By stepping into the others' shoes, I want you to know that we don't have to care for ALL our people but we have to care for ALL our people in the best way.
Since you shown yourself great attention on Vietnamese education, I suggest you to search for more information about American higher education system to clarify yourself about the difference in the average academic level of American and Vietnam before we can talk more about the topical decision.
I look forward to learning more from you.
Sincerely,
Stone.
Dear Stone,
ReplyDeleteI grew up in Vietnam. I knew our problems. I have seen lives ruined. Indeed many of my friends were killed in the army because the education system purposely made it ultra difficult for people to pass, just to "keep the value of the degree" as the educators said at the time. If you flunked, you went into the army, at that time.
I saw a lot of injustice in the elitist exam system that served no good purpose, while the curriculums sucked.
The current problem of the education system is in curriculum, not in national or school exam.
I have done my analysis in my last posting. And I have said that over the years. There has never been a plausible counter-argument. All I have heard is the unfounded fear that if we have no national exam, the quality will go down, without any logical argument to back up.
If national exam is so good, why do we have so many education problems now?
Maybe if the school are allowed to manage themselves without big daddy doing everything, then many of these problems will go away.
I am advocating the abolishment of such an unjust and unfair system. And of course, I would bank my children's future on that if I lived in Vietnam. This has nothing to do with the US system. This has a lot to do with inequality in Vietnam, for the rural poor and the ethnic minorities.
But it is not a matter theory. If Vietnam doesn't solve this inequality fast, political problems will come in less than 10 years. There are many other inequalities too. If the government can fix it in education, it will be able to fix other areas. If it can't see this big and blatant one, it can't see, nor solve, any other problems. And that means troubles will definitely come. And I am very unsure about my prediction of 10 years. Ten years is for normal global economic climate. With roller-coaster world economy, anything may happen ANY TIME.
Mark my words.
Have a great day :-)
Dear H,
ReplyDeleteNobody can be sure about the future,
If we do good things, we'll get good results and vice versa , " gieo nhân nào gặt quả đó".
While reading your analysis, I realized that you tend to provide good economic/business opportunities for low-quality universities by permit them to open low-quality universities for bad students, not poor students. While the current tuition fee in Vietnam for students is not very high, students' economic status do not required to be rich to enter good-quality colleges, but their own academic quality. By canceling the national high school exam, we would have more students like hoa hậu Thùy Dung entering "new low-quality universities" that is suitable to her low academic quality, not because she's poor, but because she's rich and affordable to that low quality university. Of course, if the newly opened universities/colleges with low-quality provided free educational opportunities like community colleges in USA, the case would be different. However, dare the new colleges do business without income? If new colleges with low quality would be permitted to admit low quality students, I am sure those colleges would charge very high tuition because it serves the bad, not the poor. As a teacher in an international high school in Vietnam, I know exactly what I am saying.
Then, I asked you to consider the educational system of USA because of many reasons. From the point of view of a students studied about USA, I can easily see Mr. Hac's intention to apply the model of education system of USA to VN. However, the difference between average academic level in America and Vietnam is so large that even the realistic educational philosophy of John Dewey would become a disaster in Vietnam. For example, let's consider one of four important elements of Porter's diamond to education: the human, the key element in education. People in developed countries like USA has apparent advantage of self-discipline while in VN, I don't think so. Therefore, American can let each school handling their exams privately as you known. However, if a Vietnamese principle has the legal authority to handle everything in his/her school exam privately, terrible things would happen: If you wanna passed, give me 100k and keep silent?! or I'll teach about the exams in my house, so you should come to class in my house, here's my number...?!
Back to the topic.
If we cancel the national high school exam and still keep the uni entrance exam, perhaps, 100% students would graduate from high school without high quality. Therefore, just about 40% of them can continue to pass the uni entrance exams.
If we cancel the uni entrance exam ans still keep the national high school exam, perhaps, 80% students would graduate from high school with high quality. Therefore, perhaps 79% of them can continue to enter the universities/colleges, without any entrance exam.
In compare of that, the second solution would be more logical, if your target is to provide more educational opportunities for poor students.
Last but not least, I totally agree with you that the curriculum of the program is the key answer for this issue. However, I won't consider about that academic issue of education before the managerial issue of education could be solved.
Sincerely,
Stone.
Dear Stone,
ReplyDeleteI have lots of relatives in the countryside and sadly extremely few of them have a chance for college, so you don't have to tell me the rural poor's problems. I know about them more than anyone or statistics can tell me.
You have missed my main point: The national exam only keeps the weaker students in the countryside and the ethnic minorities out of college. Please don't call these students bad students. Many of them are weak, because the schools in those areas are weak. And that is natural for AT LEAST another 50 years. Don't punish the students because of a natural condition. This is exactly like discrimination against the handicapped.
And what is wrong about allowing weak students to enter college? Who said the college system will be bad if you have weak students in them?
If we allow more colleges to open so that every kid can enter some college, then the system can allow many students to grow. Some colleges are not as good as others, but their quality WILL improve by:
1. Natural competition among all colleges to gain good reputation to attract good students.
2. Government guidance and quality control by keeping a minimum standard of curriculum quality and a CERTIFICATION process to indicate quality.
In economics, it is like restaurants. In the old days, the government ran all the restaurants and they all sucked. Now we have all kinds of restaurants, from 5 stars to no star. Some restaurants are not good, but the overall scene is better than the old days 100 times.
Right now, the education system is still very much monopolized by the government, not enough room for all the kids, and we try to keep kids out of schools by using exams.
The solution is:
-- Making it easier for people to open universities and colleges, especially local community colleges for local kids.
-- let schools handle all their exams and entrances (self manage--no need for national HS graduation exam and no need for university entrance exam either. Let each school handle its own affairs)
-- allow all the kids opportunities for schools (be they good schools or weak schools)
-- let schools compete for reputation and quality.
-- The government (MOET and its branches) should focus efforts on helping the SCHOOLS themselves maintain quality: Guidelines and suggestions for curriculums, certification programs, grant incentives, etc.
-- School abuses are controlled by: (1) government enforcing law and ethics and (2) competition among schools--bad schools, like bad restaurants, will eventually collapse.
In sum, what we need now is to open up the system to allow more opportunities, more competition, more creativity. That is MANAGEMENT solution. Mangement solution is not in the exams, for God's sake!
We can not keep the system closed and tight as of now and keep hundreds of thousands of kids each year from the education system. Let me repeat the number: Hundreds of thousands of kids are kept out of colleges each year.
Do we need Einstein to figure out these numbers for a hot bed of political troubles? How hard is that to see a huge tank coming your way?
Have a good day. :-)
Hoanh
Note: To add insult to the plight of the poor, if the parents are rich enough to send the kid to the US, the kid is amost guaranteed to finish a college, even a PhD degree, and the degree looks good because it is an American degree. While the kid in a poor area of Vietnam can work 10 times as hard and may still be kept out of college.
Dear H,
ReplyDeleteThank you for your specification,
I still do not know how your analysis can support the poor students. Let's assume that I agree with your idea to open more schools in form of local community college to provide more opportunities for more kids, will those school provide free education or even charge higher than the normal school? Will those schools support more poor children or simply just do their educational business to get income?
If you want to do something to the poor, which takes the majority in VN, do it free!
In America, most of local community colleges are financially free to whom would like to go on college. Will that policy be affordable to VN? No, course of not.
I am sure you know this big gap in your analysis, that's why you're unsure about your prediction in the next 10 years. However, as I stated, they made a lot of mistake, one more would not kill. The worst thing of the Vietnamese education is that everybody created challenges for themselves and believed that they can overcome those challenges, but in fact, they could not, cannot and will not.
By the way, there's nothing wrong with "weak" students to enter college in they are rich, but there are bunches of issues with "weak" students to enter college in they are poor, financially.
When a rich and weak student cannot study, he/she can change schools to find a suitable schools because he/she is rich. When a poor and weak student cannot study, he/she cannot do anything but to give up with feelings of regret that he/she wasted his/her parents financial support. "Bần cùng sinh đạo tặc", I am speechless thinking about this.
Sofar, the education market is very potential and promising in VN. However, doing educational business is different from restaurants and other businesses. When people do business, they aim at private fortune to be successful. When people do educational business, they aim at social fortune to be successful.
So let's think again your analysis, in regard of financial issue. What you wanted is more students entering college. So, let's open the uni entrance by canceling the uni entrance exam. There's nothing to do with the high-school exam here, if you don't aim at your private fortune.
Sincerely,
Stone.