The Resolution No 01/2014 released by the HCM City People’s Committee on preschool education support says that a nurses at state-owned preschools receive salaries from the state budget.

Meanwhile, the circular No 06/2015 released by the ministries of Education & Training and Interior Affairs dated March 16 does not mention the position of nurse.

As such, preschools still cannot recruit babysitters, though a nurturing staff plays a very important role in preschools’ operation.

Babysitters help teachers take care of children and manage the classes, and are in charge of cleaning the classrooms, toys, corridors and other works.

However, the circular No 06/2015 only recognizes four support positions at preschools, namely accountant, office assistant, healthcare officer and cashier.

The headmaster of a preschool in HCMC said the government plan on receiving six to 18-month old children still cannot be implemented because of a lack of babysitters. 

If the school wants to recruit babysitters, it will have to pay the babysitters with its own money, because the state budget will not pay.

A report of the HCM City Education and Training Department showed that only the preschools in four districts in the city have babysitters who work under labor contracts signed with the preschools and receive salaries from the preschools.

According to Nguyen Thi Thanh from the district 12’s education sub-department, the preschools in the locality need 187 nurses, but cannot go ahead with the recruitment plan.

“The schools planned to recruit babysitters after the city’s resolution was released. However, the recruitment plan had not been implemented when the ministries’ circular No 06 was released,” she explained.

“We have no other choice than to keep waiting,” she said.

And for the time being, teachers have to be involved in nursing. 

Nguyen Thi Kim Van, headmaster of the Meo Con Nursery School, said preschool teachers are not trained to take the jobs of cleaning toilets and classrooms.

“As teachers have to take on too much work, they are getting overloaded,” Van said, adding that this was one of the causes of an increase in child abuse cases reported recently.

“Only the schools which have good sources of income can recruit babysitters. At other schools, all the work is put on teachers’ shoulders,” she explained.

Luu Hong Uyen, head of the district 6 education sub-department, said that state-owned preschools in the locality could not recruit babysitters due to the newly released circular and the government’s policy on cutting out waste at state’s agencies.

Meanwhile, Thanh said that the staff in nursery schools could not be cut because  existing workers have become overloaded with work.

NLD