VietNamNet Bridge – It’s now the time for universities to sprint to look for more lecturers to meet the new requirements of the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), under which the number of students the schools can enroll depend on the material facilities and the teaching staff.

Under a new regulation set up by MOET, schools will have to elaborate the enrolment targets themselves based on the two criteria, the permanent teaching staff and the school campus areas. The schools must have at least one lecturer for every 25 students, and 2 square meters of school area for every student.

Therefore, schools have geared up to recruit more lecturers, because if they have more lecturers, they would be able to enroll more students.

Racing to seek university lecturers

The notices on recruiting new lecturers appear on nearly all the websites of the schools and mass media. The notices do not generally say “new lecturers wanted,” but say they need permanent lecturers, i.e. those, who teach at classes.

Dr Tran Manh Dung, Head of the Training Division of the Banking Academy, said that recruiting new lecturers is the thing the school does every year in order to seek capable lecturers to replace retired lecturers or those, who leave the school for overseas training courses. However, Dung has admitted that the school has a bigger driving force for this year’s recruitment plan, because the number of lecturers would decide the number of students to be enrolled.

In the last two or three years, the academy recruits 30-40 new lecturers a year. Meanwhile, in 2011, the school tried to look for up to 70-80 lecturers.

According to Dung, in previous years, the number of students was also defined based on the number of lecturers, but the lecturers included visiting teachers as well. Meanwhile, nowadays, the teaching staff only means permanent lecturers.

The Thang Long University, which now has 7000 students and 186 permanent lecturers, is also hurriedly looking for new lecturers to fulfill the 2011’s lecturer employment plan. An officer of the school has revealed that the school plans to find up to 100 lecturers this year.

In December 2011 alone, the school found 17 lecturers for economics, English and social works majors

The recruitment market bustling

According to Dr Nguyen Manh Hung, President of Nguyen Tat Thanh University, under the new regulations, universities will not provide vocational training; therefore, the school will increase the number of students for university (4-year training) and junior college (3-year training) level.

“Therefore, we will have to upgrade the teaching staff by inviting big universities to train masters for the school,” he said.

When someone signs a labor contract with the school, he needs to promise to obtain master degree after three years. “In the immediate time, the school plans to recruit 150 lecturers, especially those, who have master degree or doctorate. However, it is now very difficult to find the people with such degrees.

Ngo Thi My Lan, Deputy Head of the Training Division of the Hoa Sen University, said that the school has one lecturer for every 38.6 students. Therefore, the school needs to find more permanent lecturers to satisfy the new requirements of MOET. Nguyen Thi Mai Binh, Head of the Training Division of the Hung Vuong University, also said that the school is looking for 30 new lecturers.

While the Van Lang University can meet the requirements in terms of material facilities, it still has problems with the teaching staff. With the new regulation, the school would be able to enroll 1500 student sonly.

According to Vo Van Tuan, Head of the Training Division of the school, the school has 10,000 students, which means that it needs 400 lecturers, while the school has 320 lecturers only.

Source: Tien phong