As such, the assessment of students’ abilities won’t be based on the average points of all subjects as currently applied.

Under the old mechanism, students needed to have a GPA of 8.0 for all subjects to be considered excellent students. But now, under the new calculation method, they need to have a minimum average point of 8.0 for six subjects for the ‘Good’ assessment, with no discrimination between major and subordinate subjects (currently, mathematics, literature and foreign languages are considered major subjects, while others are considered subordinate ones).

The newly released circular will take effect from September 5, or when the new academic year begins, for sixth graders.

The circular says there are two methods of assessing students’ abilities – by comments and by scores.

The former will be applied to some subjects, including physical education, arts, music, fine arts, local educational content, experiential activities and career guidance. The results of these subjects will be assessed as Pass and Fail.

Regarding assessments with comments, teachers use oral or written form to comment on students' performance, commenting on the progress, outstanding features and major limitations of students.

The assessments with comments combined with scores will be applied to other subjects.

The regular assessments will be implemented through oral and writing tests, presentations, experiments and project implementation.

The official periodic assessment will be implemented through writing or computer tests, practical works, or projects. Students will have four periodic tests for every subject.

The learning results of the whole academic year will be assessed with the marks Good, Fair, Pass and Fail.

Students will get ‘Good’ if they have ‘Pass’ for all subjects assessed with comments; and have an average of 6.5 at minimum for all subjects assessed with comments combined with scores. Of these, at least six subjects must have 8 or higher.

Students will get ‘Fair’ if they have ‘Pass’ for all subjects assessed with comments; and have the average of 5.0 at minimum for all the subjects assessed with comments combined with scores. Of these, at least six subjects must have 6.5 or higher.

Students will get ‘Pass’ if they have no more than one subject assessed with comments as ‘Fail’; and have an average of 5 at minimum for at least six subjects assessed with comments combined with scores. None of the subjects will have a score under 3.5.

The ‘Fail’ will be given to the remaining cases.

The students’ conduct will also be graded on four levels Good, Fair, Pass and Fail. 

Thuy Nga

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