Authorities of Vietnam’s southern metropolis of Ho Chi Minh City have given a nod to local primary schools to hire foreign teachers to teach English from the 2012-2013 academic year. The move aims to help local schools partly cover a current serious shortage of English speaking teachers.
“We encourage the education and training sector to ensure each primary school has at least one native English speaking teacher,” city authorities added.
Municipal authorities asked the sector to build selection criteria as well as a salary level to submit the municipal People's Committee for approval.
The 2011-2012 academic year marks the second year since a pilot program to expand foreign language teaching and learning for the national education system for the 2008-2020 period following the Prime Minister’s direction has been run. It is also the thirteen year that the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Education and Training has implemented English teaching in primary schools.
Under the Ministry of Education and Training (MoET)’s regulations, English teachers in pilot programs are not allowed to teach over 18 hours per month. Therefore, the total salary an English teacher can afford to earn is only VND1.4 million-VND2.1 million per month, excluding other benefits.
The low wage has discouraged them, leading to the trend that more teachers had left schools for other well-paid jobs. (VietNamNet Oct 10)
