Expanding the high-quality public school system: Careful research is needed

The model of high-quality public schools, progressive and modern inter-level schools, and public schools in cooperation with foreign training, if invested and expanded by Hanoi, needs careful consideration along with appropriate policies to promote equality in access to education.

Equity in Education

As of July 2024, Hanoi has 16/17 public preschool and general education institutions with self-sufficient regular expenditures. Chu Van An Secondary School - Long Bien is a high-quality public education institution that has not yet self-sufficient regular expenditures. The other 6 high-quality schools in Hanoi are private.

Since the current law does not have specific regulations on the financial mechanism applicable to high-quality public educational institutions, public educational institutions with many levels of education, and public educational institutions implementing educational cooperation with foreign educational institutions, the City People's Council will vote to decide on the annual tuition fee. For example, in the 2024-2025 school year, this tuition fee was announced on October 4, 2024, with the collection ranging from 3.3 million VND to 6.1 million VND/month.

Math class at Ngoc Hoi High School (Hanoi). Photo: NTCC

Depending on the school and training system, there will be different differences, but in general, compared to the tuition fees of other public preschools and general schools in the same area, they are many times higher, especially from the 2025-2026 school year, all public preschool and general school students will be exempted from tuition fees, so clearly this is a big difference.

Dr. Nguyen Tung Lam - Chairman of the Hanoi Educational Psychology Association said that the 2024 Capital Law has many specific provisions, including investment in education, building a public school system, high-quality educational facilities, multi-level educational facilities... However, general education is meant to provide equal access to education for all students. If too much emphasis is placed on investing in a number of public schools in the context of limited budget resources, other areas will be affected.

“There needs to be specific statistics on the effectiveness of the high-quality public school model, considering the overall picture of education in the capital where there are still many schools with difficulties in terms of facilities, teacher resources, etc. to have appropriate investment based on the principle of ensuring fairness, creating conditions for each student to maximize their talents and abilities, helping them better orient their future” – Dr. Nguyen Tung Lam acknowledged.

Associate Professor, Dr. Bui Thi An - President of the Hanoi Women Intellectuals Association said that Hanoi needs to do a good job in planning, including not allowing the situation of building houses without building schools, causing overload of schools in newly built urban areas. It is necessary to review all infrastructure, including educational infrastructure; population density distribution in districts, review school-age students and forecast population growth rate to proactively grasp the situation.

Concerns from private schools

Looking at the private school system, Dr. Nguyen Tung Lam analyzed that if high-quality public schools are massively developed, it will affect the policy of socializing education. Because in recent years, the non-public education system in Hanoi has shared the responsibility of training students very well, creating the best learning environment for them as well as solving the overload of public schools. Meanwhile, budget spending is still guaranteed, helping to have more resources to invest in expanding and upgrading public educational facilities that are still difficult... Investing in high-quality public schools with a large budget needs to be carefully calculated.

Mr. Lam also proposed that there should be a mechanism to encourage the socialization of education in inner-city areas and areas lacking schools, provided that these schools are within the planning and have tuition fees suitable to the economic conditions of the people.

Dr. Nguyen Van Hoa - Chairman of the Nguyen Binh Khiem Education System Council (Cau Giay District, Hanoi) analyzed that for many years, the number of students in public schools in Hanoi has been a "difficult problem" to solve due to population pressure and the increasing demand of learners. Therefore, instead of spending a lot of budget to invest in a number of high-quality public schools, it is necessary to prioritize the construction, expansion and development of the entire public education system, focusing on building the team, investing more in facilities and improving quality. So that public schools can all enter a fair competition with the private school system.

Source: https://daidoanket.vn/mo-rong-he-thong-truong-cong-lap-chat-luong-cao-can-nghien-cuu-ky-10302346.html