VietNamNet Bridge – Foreign language faculties of many universities have been fallen into the “living death” because they do not get enough students.

Most universities and junior colleges have released reports about the numbers of students registering to take entrance exams to the schools, which show that very few students have registered to study foreign languages, especially French, Chinese and Russian.

The low competition ratio of 1/0.2

The HCM City University of Education plans to enroll 40 students for every foreign language major. However, it has received 24 registrations for the Russian-English bilingual major, 37 registrations for French and 45 applications for Chinese teaching majors.

Non-pedagogical study branches have also received very few applications. French language department, for example, has received 54 applications while it plans to enroll 50 students, Chinese language has received 93 applications while it plans to enroll 110 students, while the figures for Chinese language are 108 and 100, respectively. Especially, only eight students have registered to study Russia-English languages, while the study branch offers 50 seats.

As such, the competition ratios of the majors are very low, between 1/0.2 and 1/1.1 (one student has to compete with 0.2 or 1.1 other students to obtain a seat at the university).

The HCM City University of Social Sciences and Humanity has also reported that the lowest competition ratios belong to foreign language majors. Spanish and philology, for example, have got 66 applications, while it plans to enroll 50, German philology has got 79, while it plans to enroll 40. The figures are 149 and 90, respectively, for French philology

Local and regional schools are facing the same situation. The Can Tho University, for example, has got 29 applications only, while it needs 35 for the French language major. It has got 86 applications, while it needs 60 for English language. At the Foreign Language University under the Da Nang University, French teaching major has got 11 applications, Chinese teaching 26, Russian language 37, while Thai language 15, while the school plans to enroll 35 students for each major.

Why do students turn their back on foreign language studies?

Trinh Minh Huyen, Deputy President of the Ton Duc Thang University, said that there are only several schools training bachelors in Chinese, but the schools still do not receive many applications from students. Ton Duc Thang, for example, has got 96 applications, while it plans to accept 60 students.

Huyen admitted that Chinese language proves to be the study branch which finds it most difficult to enroll students, even though there have been more opportunities for jobs recently, since more Taiwanese and Chinese companies come to Vietnam to do business and seek the employees who can speak Chinese.

Huyen said that Vietnamese students keep indifferent to Chinese language, because this is really a difficult subject to learn. Besides, they believe that they would have more job opportunities with English, rather than Chinese. Therefore, every year, the school has to seek students for Chinese faculty from the ones, who fail the entrance exams to prestigious schools (under the current laws, those students, who fail the exams to registered schools, can go studying at other schools if they have enough marks from the exams as required by the other schools)

According to Ta Quang Lam, Deputy Head of the Training Division of the HCM City University of Education, students now turn their back to foreign language majors because they cannot see many job opportunities. Most of the students, graduating French language majors, for example, have to seek jobs in the tourism sector, while Russian language graduates have to seek jobs in the oil and gas industry.

Lam went on to say that it is really alarming that schools cannot maintain these study branches. “The society still needs the people with foreign language skills. Where to find qualified people if schools stop training?” he said.

Source: NLD