Legislators said Friday that newly-proposed Education Law amendments were not tough enough and allowed authorities to get away with the lax oversight that has led to the founding of sub-par schools recently.

The National Assembly Committee of Culture, Education, Youth and Children agreed with amendments to 12 issues, VOVNews reported.

But the committee also said the draft should impose more specific and tighter rules about what steps are required to obtain the proper licenses and permits to open a school, for the sake of educational investors.

Most members of the committee rejected an amendment that would give the Minister of Education the power to approve the establishment of a university, suggesting the Prime Minister was the one for the job, especially when it came to national universities.

The rapid establishment of various new universities recently has raised public concern about the quality of newly-opened institutions.

Dao Trong Thi, chairman of the committee, was quoted by Tuoi Tre as saying that it was the ministry’s fault that so many new universities had been opened recently without the capacity to provide quality educations.

Thi said that as advisor the Prime Minister, the ministry had failed to ensure quality at newly-established schools.

“The minister [of education] has not carefully evaluated each school before advising [the Prime Minister] on approvals.”

Thi said the situation would get worse if the ministry was allowed to be the sole authority responsible for green-lighting or halting university projects.

He said the Prime Minister should also bear some responsibility. “The Prime Minister has been overconfident in the ministry’s ability. He has his own mechanisms he should use.”

Representatives also said the amendments should include stipulations that require the ministry to set stricter textbook and curricula standards as the public has long complained of errors in school materials and overwhelming workloads.

“There should be penalties for those in charge, especially the minister, when errors occur in textbooks,” Thi was quoted by newswire Vnexpress as saying at the session.

Representatives also said specific and transparent regulations concerning education tuition and other fees should be included in the amendments to prevent corruption at schools.

Source: Thanh Nien