Around 70 percent of foreign teachers in Hanoi are working without labor permits and the quality of many international schools does not match their exorbitant prices, a Hanoi education official said Thursday.

The Cleverlearn Center in Ba Dinh District employs 18 foreigners, 17 of whom are part-time teachers, said Dai. Only two out of ten foreign teachers at ILA had work permits while only one-fourth of those at Language Link Vietnam had been issued the permits, according to statistics presented by Dai.

He said only the Hanoi International School and Sakura Kindergarten have all of their foreign employees working full-time and with labor permits.

According to Dai, schools only offer full time positions to extremely accomplished and experienced candidates, meaning that most of their teachers don’t meet the requirements and have to teach part-time.

“The result is that many schools are labeled ‘international’ but students have few chances to interact with qualified foreign teachers,” he said.

Not good enough

Reports by Hanoi Department of Investment and Planning discussed at the conference showed that the city had 35 education and training institutions funded by foreign investment as of September but the city Department of Education and Training was only overseeing operations at 20 of them.

Dai said the facilities and equipment at these institutions, which use foreign programs and textbooks, were not good enough to warrant the extraordinarily high tuitions they charge.

He said Hanoi International School was the capital’s only school employing foreign teachers that has its own equipment while other foreign schools rented laptops, projectors and other supplies.

Pham Hong Quan, general director of Hanoi International School, said regulations guiding the administration of schools were not clear and thus local authorities have to consult the central government to deal with each issue at each school separately.

“That’s wasting time and does not guarantee transparency,” he said.

‘Sensitive’

Vu Thanh Huyen, deputy head of the International Cooperation Department at the Ministry of Education and Department, said drafting regulations for institutions that employ foreign teachers takes a lot of time.

Huyen described the field as “sensitive”.

Dai suggested that the Ministry of Education and Training issue a decree on international cooperation at institutions that employ foreign teachers and submit the plan to the government.

Source: Thanh Nien