Students' Experiences of Teaching and Learning Reforms in Vietnamese Higher Education

Tran Le Huu Nghia, Ly Thi Tran

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Print ISBN:
  9780367023188
• eBook ISBN:
  9780429682131
• Topic: Education
• Subtopic: Education General

Located within the global changing contexts of higher education in the 21st century, this book examines the reform of the teaching and learning practices in Vietnamese universities under the Higher Education Reform Agenda and the influence of internationalization on the higher education sector. Specifically, it analyses the motives, current implementation, effectiveness, and challenges of these reforms, especially from student perspectives. Analyzing approximately 4300 survey responses and interviews with students, the book covers a range of key issues related to teaching and learning in higher education which have attracted attention in recent years, including:

• The learning environment
• Student support and first-year transition
• Student-centred teaching
• The use of credit-based curricula
• The use of information and communication technology
• At-home internationalization of higher education
• Assessment and feedback
• Work placements
• Informal learning via extra curricular activities
• Students' perception of the values of university education.

1
Higher education reforms in Vietnam

Context, foci, and challenges

Introduction

This book reports the context, priorities, and challenges of teaching and learning reforms in Vietnamese universities. Vietnam’s higher education reforms over the past 25 years have targeted a number of key areas deemed to be in need of improvement, including HE autonomy and governance; curriculum, teaching, and learning; assessment; graduate employability; and internationalization. In particular, the reforms have facilitated the shift to the credit-based training system and the moves towards granting greater autonomy to public universities that have paved the way for innovating university leadership and governance, finance, curriculum, enrolments, and internationalization. These reforms have also provided more favorable conditions for importing and adapting foreign curriculum and pedagogical practices. These reforms have led to initial positive impacts on the learners, the teaching and learning practices, and the system (Nguyen & Tran, 2019). Nevertheless, various policy documents and research projects have identified some key areas of shortcomings in the current HE sector in Vietnam, including the unsatisfactory quality of teaching and learning, outdated curriculum, disconnection between curriculum and labour market demands, lack of autonomy, and insufficient research capacity (Hayden & Lam, 2007, 2010; Tran & Duyen, 2018; Tran, 2018, 2019a; Ngo, 2019; Nguyen & Tran, 2017; Tran, Ngo, Nguyen, & Dang, 2017; Nguyen & Tran, 2019). This chapter focuses on discussing the aims, context, impacts, and challenges associated with the key reforms in Vietnamese HE over the past 25 years.

Overview of Vietnamese higher education

Vietnam is the world’s 14th and ASEAN’s 3rd largest nation with a population of 97 million people. The country experienced a long period of warfare and was colonized and partly occupied by China, Japan, France, and America. Vietnam finally achieved national unification with the withdrawal of the American army and the collapse of the US-backed South Vietnam government in 1975.

Scholars in the field have argued that Vietnamese education in general, and higher education in particular, has been influenced by the historical and political circumstances of the nation, given its distinctive history marked by warfare and foreign colonization (Tran, Marginson, Do et al., 2014). Prior to 1990, Vietnamese HE was often regarded as a passive recipient of external influences from China, France, the United States, and the socialist countries. Existing literature suggests the country was ‘colonised, dominated, controlled or strongly affected by foreign countries, even while at the same time the nation resisted those forces, and creatively adapted foreign ideas to the national context, both at grass-roots level and in government’ (Tran, Marginson, Do et al., 2014, p. 127). Since 1990, Vietnam has been more proactive in engaging with a wide range of foreign partners, such as Australia, the Netherlands, Canada, Germany, Japan, and Malaysia, in its internationalization activities and HE reforms.

The purposes of Vietnam’s contemporary higher education are situated within the broad goals of Vietnamese education. The Education Law issued in 2005 highlights ‘the goals of education are to educate the Vietnamese into well-rounded citizens who possess ethics, knowledge, physical health, aesthetic sense and profession, loyal to the ideology of national independence and socialism; to shape and cultivate one’s dignity, civil qualifications and competence, satisfying the demands of the development and defence of the Fatherland’ (Prime Minister, 2005, p. 2). Within this broad framework, the purposes of Vietnamese HE, which are stated in the Revised Education Law issued on 27 June 2019, are twofold: (1) to develop a highly educated workforce, nurture talent, enhance research and science to produce new knowledge and products to meet the demands of Vietnam’s economic and social developments, national defence and security, and international integration; and (2) to educate well-rounded learners who possess ethics, knowledge, health, aesthetic sense, and professional responsibility, capable of keeping up with advanced science and technology, to self-learn, to create and adapt to the workplace; and possess an entrepreneurial mindset and willingness to serve the people (Vietnamese National Assembly, 2019, p. 15). Vietnam represents a unique country where the ideologies of national independence and defence of the Fartherland have been explicitly weaved into the government’s naratives on the purposes of contemporary higher education.

Despite remarkable achievements in basic education, health, and income (Do & Do, 2014), Vietnam’s HDI (Human Development Indicators) index of 0.693 in 2018 (up from 0.475 in 1990) ranked only 118 out of 189 countries (UNDP, 2019). Positioned as being the key to national capacity building, HE has however been identified as the weakest education sector in Vietnam (Tran, Margin-son, Do et al., 2014). Vietnam’s HE system has expanded significantly over the past 25 years. This substantial expansion is a response to the rapid growth of the economy and middle-class families in Vietnam, resulting in increased demands for HE (Tran, Phan, & Marginson, 2018). This expansion is, at the same time, the result of unprecedented upgrading of technical secondary schools to colleges and from colleges to universities, especially during the early 2000s (Tran, Marginson & Nguyen, 2014). Between 2000 and 2015, the numbers of universities and colleges increased from 178 to 442, and student enrolments in tertiary education rose from 899,500 to above 2.2 million (General Statistics Office of Vietnam, 2020). In 2018, Vietnam had 237 HEIs with the 2017–2018 undergraduate and postgraduate enrolments reaching 437,156 and 48,106 students, respectively (MOET, 2019a). The number of HEIs, in fact, surpassed the target of 224 set by the government in Decision 37 (37/2013/QĐ-TTg; MOET, 2013).

Latest data from the World Bank shows that gross tertiary enrolment in 2016 was almost 29%, an increase from 16% in 2005 (World Bank, 2020). In particular, the female tertiary enrolment ratio (32%) was considerably higher than the male ratio (26%; ibid). The number of academics was 74,991, and even though close to half of academics (36,550 out of 74,991) were female, 83% of senior academics at the professorial and associate professional levels were male (MOET, 2019a, 2017). Gender inequality presents a concern in professional development and career progression in academia, and women remain poorly represented at the senior academic levels in Vietnamese universities. In terms of ownership, in 2018 there were 170 public and 65 private HEIs (MOET, 2019a). There are five foreign-owned institutions, more commonly referred to as international universities (Tran, 2019). Among them, RMIT represents a successful case. As the first institution of this type opened in 2001, it enroled approximately 6500 students in 2019 in its degree programs in two campuses in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City (RMIT Vietnam, 2019).

With regard to HE governance and structures, Vietnam has been heavily influenced by the Soviet HE model, including centralized state control, the mono-disciplinary university structure, and the separation of most HEIs focusing mainly on teaching from research institutes governed by ministries or the central government. These three distinctive influences have been tackled gradually over the past 25 years through various reforms to the system, but some key problems remain unresolved. The introduction of the Higher Education Reform Agenda (HERA) and its Autonomy and Accountability for Public Universities Decree (115/2005) marked the first reform effort in 2005 to grant HEIs greater autonomy, which will be discussed in more details in the section on HE autonomy and governance. The promulgation of Government Decree No. 97, which established Vietnam National University in Hanoi in 1993, which was followed by the forming of some other multidisciplinary universities, was a revolutionary move to depart from the Soviets’ mono-disciplinary model. However, to date, there are still many HEIs, especially in the public sector, that are mono-disciplinary (Salmi & Pham, 2019). The prevalence of universities with an almost exclusive focus on teaching and without considerable research engagement is also notable. In particular, only 59 universities were granted permission to deliver doctoral education programs by 2016 (Salmi & Pham, 2019).

In the QS World University Rankings released by Quacquarelli Symonds (QS) in June 2018, two Vietnamese universities – Ho Chi Minh National University and Hanoi National University – were among the top 1000 best universities. In 2019, QS also listed eight Vietnamese HEIs in the top 500 Asian universities (Higher Education Department, 2019). A hundred and twenty-one HEIs and three colleges – making up approximately 51% of all institutions – were found to have met the HE standards in a survey conducted by Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) in 2019 (Linh, 2019). Six Vietnamese universities were accredited by the High Council for the Evaluation of Research and Higher Education (HCERES). These figures indicate that the Vietnamese HE system has made some progress in lifting its international ranking and meeting some national and international standards. However, the government’s ambition to have Vietnam’s top-tier universities in the top 200 universities of the world by 2020 was far from a reality.

Policy documents on Vietnamese HE reforms

Key reforms to the Vietnamese HE system over the past 25 years are outlined in the following policy documents:

• Higher Education Reform Agenda (HERA) manifest by Resolution 14/2005/ND-CP
• Education Law 2005 (38/2005/QH11)
• Higher Education Law 2012 (08/2012/QH13)
• Strategy for Education Development for Vietnam 2011–2020 (Decision 711/QĐ-TTg, 13/6/2012)
• Decree 73/2012/ND-CP on foreign cooperation and investment in education
• Decree 86/2018/ND-CP on foreign cooperation and investment in education (replacing Decree 73/2012/ND-CP)
• Decree 73/2015/NĐ-CP on the stratification and ranking of HEIs
• Amended Higher Education Law 2018 (34/2018/QH14)
• Revised Education Law issued in June 2019 (43/2019/QH14)

The Higher Education Reform Agenda (HERA) manifest by Resolution 14/2005/ND-CP emphasizes ‘a comprehensive reform of the HE system with the aims to improve the quality of teaching and learning, enhance the efficiency, and broaden the scope of the system in response to the demands of modernization and industrialization, international integration, and people’s needs’ (Prime Minister, 2005, p. 1). By 2020, Vietnamese HE should be able to keep up with the regional standards and approach international standards to enhance its competitiveness and meet the demands of the socialist-oriented market economy (ibid). The HERA focuses on the following key dimensions: reforming curricula, renovating training and education, developing a credit-based training system, renovating university admission, and refining program management. These dimensions are outlined as follows:

• Reform curricula, ensure flexibility in course transfer, resolve the issues over the weights and contact hours allocated to comprehensive courses and specialist courses, and improve training efficiency. Renovate course content and align it to science, technology, and career requirements, aim to meet discipline-specific socio-economic development needs, and update course content in accordance with international standards. Promote learners’ creativity, professional skills, community-based work capabilities, and employability.
• Renovate training and education based on three criteria, i.e. equipping learners with study skills, promoting learner autonomy, and utilizing IT and media in teaching and learning. Utilize virtual open educational resources. Select and use high-quality materials and training courses from other countries.
• Develop a credit-based training system, plan and implement credit-based pathways, create favourable conditions for learners to accumulate knowledge, to change disciplines or study paths, and to transfer credits for HE levels in Vietnam and overseas.
• Renovate admission, switching away from the course quota policy with consideration given to training quality assurance, labour market needs, people’s study needs. Increase HEIs’ autonomy. Renovate admission by applying modern education assessment technology. Extend eligibility for admission to courses, create more study opportunities for disadvantaged individuals, and ensure social equity in admission.
• Refine training management; renovate course content and delivery to improve the quality in MA and PhD training.
  (Prime Minister, 2005, pp. 1–2)

The Vietnamese Education Law 2005 (38/2005/QH11) describes the basic structure of the education system in Vietnam and HE enrolment requirements. This law establishes the central role of the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) and proposes a quality-assurance framework. It is supplemented by the Vocational Training Act (76/2006/QH11), and both encourage foreign investment in education (Vietnam National Assembly, 2005).

The Higher Education Law introduced in 2012 (08/2012/QH13) includes new issues, including institutional autonomy and accountability, quality assurance, universities’ roles in research, private universities, national and regional universities, and university ranking (Vietnamese National Assembly, 2012). It specifies different forms of international HE cooperation, for example twinning programs, HEs’ representative offices, research cooperation and technology transfer, consultation, funding, investment in infrastructure, and facility development. The law also makes provision for staff and student exchange, curriculum development, library linkage, and material and information exchange (ibi...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgment
• Introduction: teaching and learning reforms in higher education and the importance of students’ learning experience
• 1 Higher education reforms in Vietnam: context, foci, and challenges
• 2 Building a favourable learning environment for students at Vietnamese universities
• 3 Facilitating the transition of first-year students into the university: a case study
• 4 Student experiences with the use of credit-based training system
• 5 Student-centred teaching: current practices and obstacles
• 6 The use of ICT in teaching and learning in Vietnamese universities
• 7 At-home international education in Vietnamese universities: impact on graduates’ employability and career prospects
• 8 Current assessment practices and the washback effect on students’ learning
• 9 Current work placement practices and challenges
• 10 Extra-curricular activities as informal learning: facilitators and inhibitors
• 11 The value of undertaking university education in Vietnam
• 12 Teaching and learning reforms in Vietnamese universities: the way forward
• Index