VietNamNet Bridge – The HCM City Education and Training Department has decided that from the 2013-2014 academic year, students’ English skills will be assessed in accordance with international standards.

TOEFEL Primary/Junior and TOEFL iBT have been recognized as the tests for assessing the English skills of primary/secondary and high school students in the city.

The department has also decided TOEIC will be the standards for assessing the ability of the students of universities, junior colleges and vocational schools.

On September 20, the education department and IIG Vietnam, the only representative of the US ETS, signed a cooperation agreement on improving the foreign language and informatics skills for university and general school students in accordance with the international standards.

Le Hong Son, Director of the HCM City Education and Training, said the department’s decision aims to provide one more assessment system, thus giving more choice to parents and students to assess students’ English skills.

Until the 2012-2013 academic year, the students’ English skill assessment had been made in accordance with the Cambridge International Examinations CIE only.

Son stressed that the application of the “TOEFL standards” will not lead to any changes in the English curricula and teaching methods being applied at schools. The schools, considering the list of the English teaching documents released by the Ministry of Education and Training, can choose the documents suitable to their conditions to organize the teaching of English.

Students can follow any one of the approved documents to learn English, and they can attend TOEFL or CIE tests.

However, Son’s explanations still cannot calm down parents, who fear that TOEFL standards would put more pressure on the foreign language teaching and learning.

Currently, the primary and secondary schools in HCM City apply different English teaching curricula, including the one set by the Ministry of Education and Training, the intensive English curriculum and the curriculum in accordance with Cambridge University ESOL.

Nguyen Hong Thu, whose daughter goes to the Bau Sen primary school in district 5, said the girl may not meet the TOEFL standards, because she has been following the ministry’s curriculum, which is thought to be “not heavy enough.”

Hoai, whose son is a student of Tran Van On Secondary School in district 1, also said that the education department proves to be “too demanding” when requiring high English skills from students, but does not improve the current English teaching program.

“I believe that even the secondary school teachers cannot obtain 100 marks from TOEFL,” he said.

Dr. Vu Thi Phuong Anh, a well-known English expert, said TOEFL is a test which aims to assess the learners’ capability to be sure that the students can use their English to study at the universities in the US. Therefore, TOEFL does not care about the learners’ training programs or learning records.

If applying TOEFL standards at general schools, this may lead to the fact that teachers and students would focus on practicing the knowledge and skills to be examined by TOEFL, while they would ignore the issues which would not appear in the list of exam questions.

Tran Dinh Nguyen Lu, an official of the HCM City Education and Training, said in the immediate time, TOEFL would be applied on a trial basis at some schools which have favorable conditions to do this.

K. Chi