VietNamNet Bridge – The number of students registering to attend the university entrance exams this year is lower than the last year, which is believed to be proof showing that Vietnamese students nowadays don’t try to follow university education at any cost.

Do Thanh Duy from the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) said the ministry has received about 1.7 million registrations to attend the 2013 exams, or 100,000 registrations lower than the last year. Of this amount, 79 percent were the registrations to attend the exams to universities (4-5 year training) and 21 percent to junior colleges (3-year training).

Duy affirmed that the decrease of 100,000 registrations was “understandable,” and that the problem would be serious only if the decrease reaches 20 or 30 percent.

Also according to Duy, the reduction in the number of students to attend university entrance exams is the result of the local authorities’ efforts to give career advices to students.

Vinh Phuc provincial authorities, for example, promise to give financial support to the students who go to vocational schools. Therefore, a lot of students decided to give up the dream of studying at university.

The central province of Thanh Hoa has also seen the sharp fall of 16,000 applications for the applications for attending exams.

However, Nguyen Van Long, Deputy Head of the provincial education and training department, believes that this is good news rather than a worry. This means that students nowadays understand what they want to do in their lives and choose the careers suitable to their capability and hobbies. It would be a great waste of money and time, if the students with weak learning capability still try to attend the exams, though they are sure of failure.

“People may see that a lot of university graduates still cannot find good jobs. Therefore, they would rather let their children to go to vocational school, or go working for money right after the high school graduation,” Long commented.

Duy has also noted that the biggest decrease has been reported from continuation education centers, which were believed to have the weaker learning capability than full-time high schools.

Previously, high school graduates automatically registered to attend university entrance exams. But many of them have given up the dream of studying at university.

Some analysts have warned that the reduction in the number of examinees may badly affect the schools’ enrolment plans, especially people-founded schools which keep complaining about the lack of students to enroll.

While Duy affirmed that schools should not be too worried about this, Tran Hong Quan, former Minister of Education and Training affirmed that people-founded schools and state owned schools would find it difficult to seek students for the training majors, which are not “hot” nowadays.

Nguyen Xuan Binh, Chief Secretariat of the Ministry of Interior Affairs, believes that the reduction in the number of registrations to attend the university entrance exams shows the imbalance between the supply and demand.

Vietnamese believe that having higher education is the best way for them to succeed in their lives. Meanwhile, there has been no effective solution for the career training and attract high school students to vocational schools.

Binh went on to say that high quantity does not mean high quality. The number of professors and PhDs at Vietnamese universities is not too low if compared with the regional countries. However, Vietnam has very few experts who can give lectures at international schools.

Tien Phong