High school graduates, while choosing universities to register to take exams for, have also chosen vocational schools to learn, if they fail the university entrance exams.

Nguyen Dinh Trung Hieu, a 12B1 class student of the Continuation Education Centre in district 1, HCM City, said that most of his classmates have to prepare spiritually that they will learn at vocational schools after they finish high school. In general, students at continuation education centres do not have a good learning capacity; therefore, the study at vocational schools proves to be a reasonable choice.

Hieu added that his classmates are worried about the new examination scheme to be applied the next year, under which two current separated exams, high school final exam, and university and junior college entrance exam will be merged into one. Students do not know what will happen in the next year when the new scheme is applied, therefore, they would rather choose the schools to learn in this year.

Nguyen Quoc Cuong, an enrollment expert under the Ministry of Education and Training, said that the number of registrations for university entrance exams from students, who failed last year’s exams made to the ministry’s representative office in HCM City, is lower than in previous years.

According to Cuong, the thing could be explained by the fact that the students, who failed the 2008’s university entrance exams, applied for vocational schools already, and they do not take exams this year.

Cuong added that more and more students will register for vocational schools this year, as the 2-in-1 exam will be applied the next year.

How vocational schools prepare for a higher number of students?

According to Ha Thi Thanh Thanh, Head of the Saigon Informatics Economics School, the school has a new study branch this year, marketing, which has been opened to meet the higher demand from students. The study branch is expected to enroll 150 students.

Meanwhile, according to the Ministry of Education and Training, the quotas for vocational training of universities will be lowered gradually in 2009-2012 with the decrease of 20% per annum.

Nguyen Quoc Hop, MA, Head of the Van Hien University’s Training Division, said that though the quota would be lower this year, the university still hopes to have more students than the last year. Hop said that the university has upgraded material facilities and hired more premises, so that students can have better learning conditions.

The HCM City Industry University said that it will enroll 6,000 students instead of 4,000 as in last year for vocational training, while it will offer a lot of new study branches for students to choose.

The Hung Vuong People Founded University said it will enroll 2,000 students for vocational training this year.

VietNamNet/TP