VietNamNet Bridge – Public universities should streamline administration of evening classes and focus on improving the quality of training provided, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Bui Van Ga says.

The evening classes are usually taken by employees wanting to improve their skill levels and students unable to gain entry into or afford daytime courses.

Ga says that the ministry will closely monitor the situation and reduce administrative expenses on evening classes by 70 per cent over regular classes.

This will be part of efforts made to address several problems plaguing the administration of evening classes at universities nationwide.

The problems were highlighted when the Da Nang City administration announced recently that it would not employ students of evening classes to work in the State-run organisations.

From the next academic year onwards, the courses offered in evening classes will be based on credits, Ga says. This would allow students of evening classes to register for some courses during the day if their time permits, he adds.

And if the students perform very well in their evening classes, they will have the possibility of transferring to regular, daytime courses, the deputy minister says.

He also says that the ministry will ask universities to organise a common exam for both daytime and evening courses.

The introduction of evening classes by universities has met the demand of learning and improving skills among those who are already employed, and offered the opportunity to students unable to enroll in daytime courses for various reasons.

It has also made it possible for universities to earn greater revenues and offer better working conditions including higher pay for their teaching and management staff.

However, Prof. Pham Minh Hac, former Minister of Education and Training, says that the current training quality in evening classes is very low and management is not tight because of insufficient monitoring and assessment by the ministry.

Many students are registering for the classes not to improve their skills knowledge and skills, but to obtain a degree that will help them gain promotions and higher salaries.

And lecturers at evening classes intentionally reduce the content of classes to enable students earn higher scores, Hac says.

Other experts say a number of lecturers hired to teach evening classes are not qualified enough.

A ministry report released last April showed that the number of students taking evening classes nationwide accounted for nearly half of two million of university students.

It is unacceptable that the training scale of evening classes is equal to that of regular classes, Hac says, adding that the ministry should review administration of evening classes at universities based on their facilities and capacity.

VietNamNet/Viet Nam News