Hanoi (VNA) - Many university lecturers in Vietnamare not qualified as they hold below standard degrees, statistics recentlyreleased by Ministry of Education and Training revealed.

The Law on Higher Education, which took effect in 2012,requires university-level lecturers to have master’s degrees or degrees ofhigher education except for specific majors. However, according to the Ministryof Education and Training, at many universities, about half of the permanentlecturers hold bachelor’s degrees.

This includes Vo Truong Toan University, a public tertiaryeducational institute in the Mekong Delta province of Hau Giang. More than 64percent of its permanent lecturers hold bachelor’s degrees.

Nguyen Tat Thanh University of Vietnam Textile Corporation inHCM City has 45 percent of its permanent lecturers holding bachelor’s degrees.Only 10 percent hold master’s degrees. The figure for Tra Vinh University is 37percent.

As many as 126 out of 276 permanent lecturers employed by theHanoi Industrial Textile Garment University hold bachelor’s degree.

Many universities have certified these lecturers even thoughthey fail to meet standards of lecturers’ quality.

Tran Ai Cam, deputy director of Nguyen Tat Thanh Universitytold Thanh Nien (Young People) newspaper that besides universitylevel, the school also offers training at college level. More than 500lecturers holding bachelor’s degrees are teaching at college level.

Only lecturers with master’s degrees or higher are allowed to teach atuniversity level, he said.

In fact, only 14 percent of students of Nguyen Tat ThanhUniversity are trained at college level. In 2017, the university did notrecruit any students at college level.
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Associate Professor Nguyen Xuan Hoan, vice principal of FoodIndustry University in HCM City said that 130 bachelor-holding lecturers of theuniversity teach college students.

“From now until 2020, the university will stop college-levelrecruitment. Bachelor-holding lecturers who do not learn to gain higher degreewill have to change their position or leave job. It is impossible to havebachelor’s degree holders teach university students,” he said.

A representative of Pham Ngoc Thach Medical University saidthe university is standardising lecturer recruitment. Some who don’t havemaster’s degree are newly-recruited or have been lecturing for a long time.

Associate Professor Nguyen Hoi Nghia, director of educationquality verification of HCM City’s National University said that theuniversities have many reasons to explain the shortage of qualified lecturers.Some explained that permanent staff members are teaching as assistants, notlecturers or they are only in charge of a laboratory, not teaching.

Others claimed that it is hard for some majors to recruithigh-quality teachers.

Nghia said that this fact is hard to accept and will affectthe quality of tertiary education.

“The State has clear standards but universities have notfollowed them,” he said.

According to experts, while the number of new majors and newuniversities keeps rising, the number of qualified teachers trained every yearcannot meet demand. This has led to bachelor holders teaching universitystudents.

“The Ministry of Education and Training must manageuniversities to stop the size of training increasing so fast that the number ofqualified lecturers does not keep up with this increase,” Nghia said.-VNA