Ministry of Education and Training adjusts regulations on joint foreign language certificate exams

Candidates taking foreign language certificate exam.

The Ministry of Education and Training has just issued Circular No. 16/2025/TT-BGDDT regulating the joint organization of foreign language proficiency certification exams, effective from October 12, 2025 (replacing Circular No. 11/2022/TT-BGDDT).

The Circular has some notable new points such as clarifying the concept of legal and popular foreign language proficiency certificates in the world ; specifying the policy of promoting decentralization and delegation; clarifying responsibilities in organizing exams to grant foreign language proficiency certificates.

Specifically, Circular No. 16/2025/TT-BGDDT emphasizes the requirement for the People's Committees of provinces and cities to manage the activities of organizing foreign language proficiency exams in the locality according to the Government 's regulations; publicly announce and update on the electronic information page the list of units approved, adjusted, extended, and terminated to organize foreign language proficiency exams in the locality.

The new Circular also amends and supplements a number of other provisions to specify the responsibilities of state management agencies and strengthen the responsibilities of parties involved in foreign language proficiency certification. The Circular specifies the responsibilities of the parties involved (publicity, transparency, accountability to society, handling of questions, ensuring the rights of test takers, etc.) in the process of implementing the linkage, organizing the examination, and granting certificates, as a basis for state management agencies to conduct post-inspection.

According to Circular 16/2025/TT-BGDDT, the Vietnamese party is the joint testing organization - the testing facility in Vietnam has an agreement or cooperation contract with a foreign language proficiency assessment facility that is primarily responsible for organizing foreign language proficiency certification exams in Vietnam.

The foreign party is the foreign language proficiency certificate-issuing unit - the foreign language proficiency assessment facility responsible for and authorized to issue foreign language proficiency certificates or the foreign language proficiency assessment facility authorized or permitted by the foreign language proficiency certificate-issuing unit to organize the certificate-issuing exam.

The Circular also affirms that foreign language proficiency certificates are not certificates of the national education system; they do not include certificates assessing learning capacity in other subjects in foreign languages or certificates assessing capacity in specialized fields for practicing in foreign languages.

Foreign language proficiency certificates are legally recognized in the host country when the competent authority of that country allows the organization of the certificate examination or is used to review immigration applications, naturalization, and grant entry visas to citizens of countries who want to settle, work, research, or study; recognize the achievement of input and output standards in training programs for international students in the country where the language used for the certificate examination is the official language.

Approval of joint organization of foreign language proficiency certificates does not include recognition of the levels of those foreign language proficiency certificates as equivalent to the levels of the 6-level Foreign Language Proficiency Framework for use in Vietnam in the national education system.

The Circular also stipulates that the implementation of joint organization of certification examinations must ensure safety and quality in accordance with the approved project; no cheating or proxy testing occurs. At the same time, it must ensure the right to protect personal data of candidates and exam organizers; absolutely no disclosure or leakage; no use of biometric data of candidates other than for the purpose of preventing cheating and proxy testing.

According to the Ministry of Education and Training, with the above new points, Circular No. 16/2025/TT-BGDDT is a step to complete the legal framework, increase transparency, clearly decentralize power and protect the rights of test takers in the joint organization of foreign language proficiency certification exams.

vietnamplus.vn

Source: https://baolaocai.vn/bo-giao-duc-va-dao-tao-dieu-chinh-quy-dinh-ve-lien-ket-thi-chung-chi-ngoai-ngu-post881410.html