During the trip accompanying Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh to visit and work in Australia, Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son had a meeting and discussion with Australian Minister of Training and Skills Brendan O'Connor on the afternoon of March 5 local time.
Minister Brendan O'Connor affirmed that the Special Summit to celebrate 50 years of ASEAN-Australia relations is an important step forward in the education and training cooperation between the two countries. According to him, this is a great opportunity for the two sides to cooperate more closely in training.
Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son works with Australian Minister of Training and Skills Brendan O'Connor (Photo: Hong Phong).
Thanking Australia for its support in training human resources for Vietnam in recent times, Minister Nguyen Kim Son also emphasized that educational cooperation is one of the important pillars in the Vietnam - Australia cooperative relationship.
"As Vietnam and Australia celebrate the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations, further developing cooperation in education, training and vocational training is very necessary and appropriate," according to Minister Nguyen Kim Son.
During Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh's visit to Australia this time, further promoting educational cooperation is also one of the very important contents, with many specific activities such as the Prime Minister visiting RMIT University, attending the inauguration ceremony of the Vietnam - Australia Policy Institute at RMIT University, organizing the Vietnam - Australia Education and Training Cooperation Forum, signing many memorandums of understanding between universities of the two countries...
Agreeing with the Vietnamese education sector commander on the direction of promoting cooperation in the field of training and vocational training, Minister Brendan O'Connor said that connections and cooperation between the two countries in the fields of higher education and vocational training should be prioritized in the coming time.
The two Ministers signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation in the field of education and training (Photo: Hong Phong).
Mr. Brendan O'Connor commented that Vietnamese students are a very large community in the international student community in Australia and have made great contributions, not only economically but also in enhancing people-to-people exchanges.
"Australia has experienced difficulties due to a shortage of human resources with the necessary skills to supply the labor market, so cooperation in training, vocational training and skills will eliminate this shortage, contributing more to the economic development of both countries," according to Minister Brendan O'Connor.
Affirming that Vietnam plays an important role for Australia, Mr. Brendan O'Connor agreed with the direction of sharing experiences and cooperating in the field of education and considered this a good opportunity to further improve the quality of education, the quality of lecturers, and the quality of training activities of the two countries.
At the meeting, the two Ministers discussed specific cooperation proposals such as: Encouraging more Australian universities to cooperate with Vietnamese universities or open branches in Vietnam; Australian universities to expand training links with Vietnam in engineering, technology, and STEM fields, because this is a group of human resources that Vietnam will have great demand for in the near future.
Vietnam also asked Australia to support the reception and training of doctoral university lecturers; expand scholarship policies for Vietnamese students and propose the next phase of the Aus4Skills program...
It is expected that the two countries' Education Ministers will sign a Government-level Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in the field of education and exchange documents in the presence of the two Prime Ministers in Canberra.
Australia is currently one of the countries that provides many Government scholarships to Vietnam with about 70 scholarships/year for long-term training programs (masters, doctorate) and short-term (post-doctoral, professional development).
There are about 26,000 Vietnamese students studying in Australia, mostly self-funded and with scholarships from schools, according to information from the Australian Embassy.
Currently, among more than 400 joint training programs between Vietnamese and foreign universities, there are 37 programs between 21 Vietnamese higher education institutions and 17 Australian partners.
In particular, with the human resource development program (Aus4Skills) for the period 2021-2025, the Australian Government will provide the Vietnamese Government with an aid of more than 50 million Australian dollars.
Vietnam receives Australian aid to send Vietnamese citizens to study in Australia, supports alumni networking activities, and implements a number of short-term training activities to enhance the capacity of management teams at higher education institutions.
Hoai Thu (From Melbourne, Australia)
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