1. NATIONAL TARGET PROGRAMS OF VIETNAM EDUCATION FOR FUTURE CHALLENGES

2. 1. International context at the beginning of 21 st century a.Scientific and technological evolution is growing rapidly which is a base for development of knowledge economy. Development of science and technology has made big changes in educational contents, teaching methods at schools and also required to provide human resources with high qualification. b.Globalization and international integration make close co- operations and drastic competitions for educational development among countries. Education has an important role to prepare human resources with high qualification and create convenient learning opportunities for people and communities. c.ITC are applied widely in all socio-economic sectors, especially in education. E-learning, distance education have became an age strength to create open-education, non-gaps and meet the training needs of learners. d.Economic and financial crises take place at all countries in the world nowadays. It is worsen in economic growths, employment, investment in all economic sectors and also in education.

3. 2. Socio-economic context in vietnam at the beginning of 21 st century Vietnam has grown rapidly in the last 20 years but the economy is still in the level of lower developing countries. Indicators showed on infrastructure, education, human development index … are ranged in 1/3 of the lowest group in the world. Vietnam has commitments on economic integration but the state system, education … still have more disparities in comparison with other countries in the world. Many issues related to destroyed environment, transport accidents, health problems, criminality…have been urgently solved. Some theoretical issues slowly resolved in practice (like marketization, enterprise’s privatization, sole’s abolishment… ) and it can limit rapid development of the economy.

4. Low Quality and competition capacity Highly consumed in energy and materials; low social productivity and high expenditure in times and money. Low in technological mutation Low capacity in enterprise’s administration Export products are concentrated on rough products with low validity and elasticity (rice, coffee, peppercorn…). These products are easily competed and replaced by products from other sources. How education can contribute to improve quality and competition capacity of Vietnam human resources and products?

5. 3. Current situation of vietnam education 3.1. Some achievements a. Educational scopes and networks are developed and meet better training needs of the society. b. Educational quality at all education and training levels is improved. Management of educational quality has paid more attention nowadays. c. All provinces, cities are recognized on national standards of an illiteration eradication, primary education universalization and continuing to achieve lower secondary education universalization. d. Educational socialization and mobilization of resources for education have achieved initially. In 2007 about 25% of all social expenditure for learning came from people contributions. In addition it has contributed from enterprises, socio-political agences and international investments.

6. e. Social equity in education has been improved, especially learning opportunities for girls, ethnic minority children, poor and disadvantaged children. Policy on exampted/reduced tution fees and provided scholarships for poor, disvantaged students is implemented nationwide. In 2007, 53% of the total pulils and students is exampted/reduced from tuition fees. f. Education management has many active changes. Quality management has been focused with improving system of quality assessment and accreditation. In 2008, the MOET complited a project on “Renovation of financial mechanizm in education and training, including tution fees”. Decentralization for training institutions are increased, especially giving more autonomy for local educational autorities and institutions in terms of teaching staff recruitment, use of state budgets, organization of training process, implementation of teaching schedules and plans..which are suitable with student’s characterictics and local conditions. Information technology is used widely in education management.

7. 3.2. Some limitations a.National education system is not synchronous, lack of integration among educational levels and training qualifications, in which vocational education is not paid properly attention. b.Education quality is still low in competition with development needs of the country currently c.Training contents and teaching methods from preschool to secondary education have been renovated but still have limitations, education programs of higher education are slowly renovated and do not meet the educational objectives. d.Teaching staff and educational managers are not met educational tasks in the new age. e.School’s infrastructure and teaching aids are lack and out of date.

8. 4. Challenges for Vietnam education development in the 21 st century a.The rapid growth of science and technology can make big gaps of economy and knowledge between Vietnam and other developed countries. Vietnam has faced with high risk of being behind the times. International integration provides not only opportunities for educational development but also bring dangers, especially penetration of cultural validity and stranger lifestyles which may erode national characters. Vietnam may import low education quality from some countries and it will cause big risk for Vietnam education in conditions of weaknesses of education management, lack of policies and appropriate measures to lead and closely evaluate educational institutions with foreign investment and management. b.Social gaps in the country are increasing, especially gaps among people groups, various development among regions, provinces. It may create unequal in accessing to education between regions and learner’s groups. c.Needs of economic development in the future require human resources not only in quantity but also in high quality. Vietnam has to restructure the economy, develop products and services with high value and technology used. It requires to have manpower with enough qualification and skills and it also creates high pressures in education and training.

9. 5. National target programs of Vietnam education upto 2020 will include following projects: 1.Implement universalization of 5 years old preschool, maintanin illiteracy eradication and primary education universalization, improve achievements of secondary education universalization and support to develop continuing education; 2.Renovate curricula, textbooks and teaching materials 3.Renovate learning-teaching assessment and develop an accreditation system of educational quality 4.Train, upgrade teaching staff and educational managers 5.Mobilize overseas Vietnamese intellectuals to participate in teaching, doing researches and to pass technological transfer in Vietnam 6.Educate and train talent pupils/students

10. 7. Increase quality and effectiveness of moral education at schools 8. Build up information system on labor markets and train according to social needs 9. Build up universities and faculties which can catch up the international levels 10. Improve capacity of vocational education 11. Support education in mountainous/disadvantage areas, ethnic minority and disadvantage students 12. Increase inclusive education for handicap children 13. Improve school’s infrastructure 14. Develop IT human resources and apply IT widely in education.

11. To achieve these national target programs we will follow the directions: Create driving force, promote resources and improve effective use the resources for education development Promote high internal force and at the same time, to strengthen international cooperation, including cooperation among ASEAN countries for education development in order to adapt future challenges. Identify priorities for educational development in each period.

12. Some figures of Vietnam education Source: - Department of Planning and Finance, MOET 1. Ratio of student per 10,000 population 2000-012001-022002-032003-042004-052005-062006-07 Ratio of student per 10,000 population 118124128140161167179

13. 2. Scope of kindergarten, preschool, primary and secondary education through years

14. 3. Training scope of secondary professional schools, vocational, higher education and post graduate education through years

15. 5. Ratio of non-public students at different educational levels

16. 6. Ratio of handicap children accessed to education in 1996 and 2005

17. 7. Ratio of state budgets contributed for education through years + State budgets contributed for education within GDP (%) + State budgets in comparison with total state budget expenditure (%)

18. Main references 1.MOET (2008). Strategy of Vietnam education development in the period of 2009-2020. 2.Le Dang Doanh. Development and economic reform in Vietnam: some requirements for education and training. The presentation given to Education Minister in September 2007. 3.Vietnam national council on Education (2005). International forum on Vietnam education on “Higher education reform and international integration”. Educational publisher.

19. Thank you for your attention!