Abolishing school boards: Opportunities and challenges from the '3 in 1' engine

Bỏ hội đồng trường: Cơ hội và thách thức từ động cơ '3 trong 1' - Ảnh 1. — A meeting of the school council of the University of Technology (Ho Chi Minh City National University). This is a school with an effective school council - Photo: NHU QUYNH

Resolution 71 of the Politburo identifies the party secretary who is also the head of a higher education institution as a "3-in-1 engine" that converges political, governance and administrative power.

This model promises to address the diffusion of power, speed up decision-making, and increase accountability. But the stronger the incentives, the greater the risk of imbalance without proper oversight and academic guidance.

Lessons from China show that the concentration of power creates both a driving force for development and a potential risk. In China, the party secretary is the "number one person" in the university, the president is only the deputy secretary in charge of academics. All major decisions are guided and approved by the party committee.

The secretary is both a decision-maker and a manager, a coordinator and a political representative. Thanks to this, many universities can mobilize resources from the state, local authorities and enterprises, closely linked to national strategies such as "Made in China 2025" or artificial intelligence and green technology programs.

However, many secretaries are criticized for lacking academic background, being administratively inclined, and undermining university autonomy and creativity. This is both a model of strength and a warning.

In Vietnam, Resolution 71 defines the Party Secretary as the head of the higher education institution. This policy helps unify leadership and overcome the situation of "three heads": Party Committee - School Council - Board of Directors.

Centralized power also shortens the time for decisions on personnel, finance, and strategy, ensuring consistent implementation of political guidelines. At the same time, it sets a new requirement: the leader must meet a "double standard": both political courage and understanding of modern university management.

The model of the party secretary who is also the head can be compared to a vehicle equipped with a "3-in-1 engine". The secretary is both the political leader and the administrator - operator, and at the same time the administrative legal entity of the university. Three powers converging in one position create a very strong engine, helping the vehicle run fast, decisively and without the dispersion of power as before.

But the more powerful the engine, the more reliable the braking and guidance signals must be. The braking is the mechanism of monitoring, checking and transparency; the guidance signals are the correct political orientation, linked to academic autonomy and social needs. Without these two elements, the vehicle can easily lose control or go off track.

Industry relations also need to be taken into account. Previously, school boards had business representatives, helping to link training strategies with labor needs.

Now that this channel no longer exists, it is easy to weaken the connection between schools, businesses and society. China’s experience is to set up advisory councils and cooperative alliances to compensate. Vietnam needs alternative mechanisms: business advisory councils, strategic cooperation agreements, and accountability reports to the labor market.

One option discussed is that the party secretary also serves as the principal. This model is extremely compact, avoids conflicts of authority, and speeds up decision-making. However, the absolute concentration of power and the overload of work pose a risk of overwhelming the academics.

This option can be applied to small, application-oriented schools, but with multidisciplinary, research-oriented, national-level universities, it is necessary to maintain relative separation: the secretary takes care of political and strategic orientation, the principal takes care of academics and administration.

It is necessary to promote the advantages and overcome the limitations of this model by standardizing leadership capacity, connecting businesses and society and nurturing a creative academic environment. Only then will the "leader" truly be a professional driver, leading Vietnamese universities to integrate and develop sustainably.