The requisite to a total reform

Vietnam is among few countries that maintain a fairly good growth rate compared to other countries in the region, many enterprises lack skilled workers in the fields of technique, technology and service sectors.

Unfortunately, a large proportion of students still put vocational training as the second choice behind higher education. Being aware of learners’ confusion, vocational education and traning institutions (VET) need to effectively reform to attract students.

First of all, it is crucial to diversify vocational courses from short to long term. A wide range of short-term training courses needs to focus on students and workers seeking or changing jobs. The schools should cooporate with businesses to design short-term training courses to meet the demands of businesses and learners.

Moreover, the training programs need to be renewed in accordance with learning outcomes, meeting the demand of labor markets. For the graduates from secondary school, the VET institutions should adjust the training method by providing them innovative thinking and practices (if no prerequisites are required) from the first year; as a result, students are able to study and make products right in practical environment with the knowledge and skills equipped. That is the appropriate way to prevent students from dropping out of school.

General subjects should be designed to integrate with occupational skill subjects, to make lessons more attractive and effective, and shorten the training time.

Some schools shorten their general education programs without the integration with vocational skill subjects, hence, students may lose their motivation to pursue apprenticeships. Likewise, other schools merge continuing education with vocational training and have the students study two degrees at a time, so they cannot be able to complete the course (there is no country but Vietnam applied that program during 3 years after secondary school). In this regard, the State should formulate policies on teaching general subjects in VET institutions.

Buiding the a good image of VET

International experience shows that in order to build up a good image for VET, in addition to the State's macro policies, each institution needs to improve the quality of training to meet market’s demand. Vivid cooperation with businesses to provide on-the-job trainings and create jobs for learners with reasonable wages.

The schools should be confident, proactive to promote their qualified graduates to businesses and have the agreement memorandum to provide trained graduates for businesses.

Communication plays an important role in promoting the quality of vocational training; it affects the rates of employment after graduation, the value of vocational training reflected through the income of learners, transparency of training levels, lifelong learning opportunities, etc. Each school should assign a leader in charge of communications and business relations.

To sum up, vocational enrollment opportunities are expanding; thus, the leaders of institutions should be more dynamic, willing to innovate school administration and renovate training programs, improve the quality of the working team and communication on VET based on promoting training quality.

In order to attract learners, the key is that after completing the studies, those who acquire vocational skills will not worry about having a job. The effectiveness of admission is highly related the rate of employment after graduation.

It is possible to get a job after 3-9 months of study

The labor market shows the fact that the high school students are able to get a job right after completing 3-to-6-month training courses in many occupations.

The local VET authorities need to reduce administrative procedures, provide the access to resources and encourage VET instittutions to improve their capacity to meet the demand of the market. The delay in completing the procedure might have the institutions miss the chances of taking advantages from the labor market.