Vu Thanh Trung Nam, a 12th grader at the Hanoi-Amsterdam High School for the Gifted, and a gold medal winner at the 2014 International Physics Olympiad, said he wants to talk to MOET’s Minister about exam reform, even though he has been allowed to follow university education without having to sit the national university entrance exam.
Many other students in Hanoi also said that MOET officials should consult students before making decisions.
“The policy makers need to learn what students want, because students are the major subjects of the exams,” said Doan Tien Dung, a high school student in Hanoi.
“In many cases, MOET made decisions without consulting students, and most of the decisions were wrong,” he said. “We want to have the right to join the debates about exam reform, because the reform will determine our future”.
“MOET always presents students with a fait accompli,” he added.
Dung’s thoughts echo those of many other high school students.
“MOET changes its mind as often as one changes his shirt,” said Lam Thanh Ha, a student at a school in the suburbs of Hanoi.
“And the changes were always made just several days before the exams. As a result, we did not have enough time to adapt to the new mechanism,” she said.
Nam of the Hanoi-Amsterdam High School for the Gifted also said that MOET needs to have thorough discussions and make decisions soon.
“One year will not be enough for students to prepare for a new exam,” he said.
Nguyen Danh Phuong, a 12th grader of the Hanoi-Amsterdam High School for the Gifted, said he does not want to see any changes with the current exam, at least for the next three years.
Phuong said that high school students have been following the old way to prepare for the finals and university entrance exam which have existed for many years. And it would be unfair for them to start everything from scratch.
“We don’t have much time to follow a new way of learning. My teachers also do not know how to adapt to the new circumstances,” Phuong said.
“I wish MOET will remove the high school final exam. Otherwise, we would rather take both the national high school final and the university entrance exams as currently applied,” he said.
A teacher noted that what worries students is not the change in the exam mechanism, but the lack of time to prepare for the exams. Therefore, policies need to be reasonable and consistent.
