Adjusting teachers' teaching time

The above content is clearly stated in Circular 05/2025 of the Ministry of Education and Training regulating the working regime for general education and university preparatory teachers. This Circular takes effect from today (April 22), replacing Circular 28/2009.

Accordingly, the working time in the school year of principals, vice principals, and teachers of general schools is 42 weeks, of which the number of weeks teaching the contents of the general education program is 37 weeks.

The actual teaching time for junior high and high school teachers has also been reduced to 35 weeks instead of the old regulation of 37 weeks for teaching and educational activities. At the same time, 2 reserve weeks have been added for teachers to complete educational content in the general education program (point a, clause 1, Article 5).

Standard number of teaching hours per week:

	Public teacher (period/week)	Boarding ethnic minority teacher (period/week)
Elementary	23 periods	21 lessons
Secondary School	19 lessons	17 periods
High School	17 periods	15 lessons

Adjusting teachers' teaching time. (Illustration: TN)

Along with clearly defining the norms, the Circular also stipulates cases where teachers are allowed to reduce the number of teaching periods/week, specifically as follows:

- Homeroom teachers in high schools have 4 periods/week reduced.

- The head of a professional group or head of a subject group will have 3 periods reduced per week; the deputy head of a professional group or deputy head of a subject group will have 1 period reduced per week.

- Teachers who are also party secretaries or party cell secretaries (where no party cell is established) in schools with 28 or more classes in regions 2 and 3, or 19 or more classes in region 1 will have their teaching hours reduced by 4 periods/week; in the remaining schools, their teaching hours will be reduced by 3 periods/week.

- Part-time positions are reduced by 3 periods/week such as: Head teacher of university preparatory school, part-time teacher of information technology (in charge of all computer rooms), clerk, librarian (in charge of the library room), support work for education of people with disabilities, female teachers raising children under 12 months old.

- When the school does not have equipment and laboratory staff, teachers who are also in charge of subject classrooms (except for the computer room) will have 3 periods/subject/week reduced, and those in charge of educational equipment rooms will have 3 periods/week reduced.

- Part-time positions are reduced by 2 periods/week such as: Teacher and school board chairman, school board secretary, head of school people's inspection committee, during probation period...

- Teachers who concurrently hold trade union work, school-level union secretary and deputy secretary are subject to a reduction in teaching hours according to separate regulations. For teachers who concurrently hold academic affairs or student counseling work, the principal shall decide to ensure that the principle is consistent with the workload assigned to them concurrently.

Thus, the total number of reductions for all teachers who are also in charge of teaching work is not higher than 8 periods/week.

The Circular also stipulates a reduction in quotas for many other positions. Each teacher cannot hold more than two concurrent positions.

Minh Khoi

Source: https://vtcnews.vn/dieu-chinh-thoi-gian-day-hoc-cua-giao-vien-ar939157.html