Education ministry’s efforts to improve higher education quality through students’ evaluation of lecturers’ performance may bring counter-effects without proper preparations and considerations, experts warned.

In fact, there are cases where lecturers are good and dedicated to their job but strict to their students, making those who are lazy hostile to them, the educator cited.

The assessment, therefore, shouldn’t be considered as the only information channel to judge lecturers, but for reference only, he stressed.

“It’s not simple to compose a questionnaire to gain students’ opinion [about their lecturers’ performance], but it needs expertise and has to be very scientific,” Nguyen Thanh Nam, head of the Academics Department from Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport, said.

Nam suggested the ministry consult other countries where the assessment is conducted professionally, while each school should set up requirements for each subject to make it more scientific and systematic.

Schools must also be careful about announcing assessment’s results, or it will hurt lecturers, Hung stressed.

Hanoi University of Sciences has already conducted the assessment since last year, although the Ministry of Education and Training said this month it is set for this school year’s second semester, usually starting in January, according to Doan Van Ve, deputy head of Academics Department.

Most of the lecturers didn’t object it, but preferred to keep the results as private as possible, he noted

Le Trong Thang, head of Hanoi University of Mining and Geology, said his school has also started the assessment,

Although it proved effective, many lecturers weren’t very pleased, saying it was strange that students were allowed to assess their teachers, according to Thang.

The move is necessary to create democratic atmosphere at school, but it should be conducted so that moral standards between teachers and students are not violated, Le Van Toan, vice president of Hanoi University of Business and Technology said.

Reported by Thanh Nien staff