Minister Nguyen Kim Son: In the near future, there will only be 3-4 pedagogical colleges left.

On December 4, the National Assembly Standing Committee gave opinions on explaining, accepting and revising a group of 5 drafts: Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Education ; Law on Higher Education (amended); Law on Vocational Education (amended);

Resolution of the National Assembly stipulating specific mechanisms on a number of guidelines and policies in Resolution No. 71-NQ/TW dated August 22, 2025 of the Politburo on breakthroughs in education and training development; Resolution on investment policies for the national target program on modernization and improvement of education and training quality for the 2026-2035 period.

In the report on receiving and explaining the opinions of National Assembly deputies, the Government said that the Draft Law on Vocational Education (amended) has revised Clause 3, Article 7 in the direction of only regulating higher education institutions to provide college-level training for specific fields (arts, sports ; teacher training; national defense, security); so that higher education and vocational education institutions operate in accordance with their functions and tasks as prescribed by current laws and in accordance with training orientations and goals, specifically as follows:

“b) Higher education institutions that are training in specific majors or groups of majors in the fields of arts and sports at the university level implement college and intermediate level training programs, and vocational secondary education programs in the same major or group of majors.

c) Higher education institutions that are training teacher training groups at the university level implement college-level training programs in the same group of majors.

d) Higher education institutions of the people's armed forces implement college and intermediate level training programs in groups of majors and occupations in the fields of national defense and security".

Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son said that in the planning of universities and colleges, the system of pedagogical colleges will soon have only 3-4 schools, and the trend is that pedagogical colleges will merge into pedagogical universities. Photo: National Assembly Media

Speaking at the meeting, Chairman of the Economic and Financial Committee Phan Van Mai said he agreed with the opinion of the review agency on allowing some universities to open colleges, not just in the field of pedagogy.

He emphasized that the opening of majors needs to be managed by specific criteria and standards. In addition to college training, universities with quality practice schools should also be considered for permission to implement this model.

Chairman of the Economic and Financial Committee Phan Van Mai. Photo: National Assembly Media

He cited that in some specific fields such as music, training facilities such as conservatories must recruit students from a very early age, even from kindergarten or elementary school. Similarly, many other professions also need to discover and nurture talent early.

According to him, if universities have human resources and facilities, it is necessary to create conditions for them to prepare input talent.

"We should be "open to some extent", manage with a system of criteria and standards to promote the effectiveness and strengths of training facilities" - Mr. Mai proposed.

Regarding the possibility of universities training at college level, Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son said that in the planning of universities and colleges, the system of pedagogical colleges will soon have only 3-4 schools, the trend is that pedagogical colleges will merge into pedagogical universities. In pedagogical universities, there will be training for preschool teachers at college level.

"In my opinion, universities can provide college-level training in a number of specialized, specialized, in-depth, and special fields according to the country's human resource needs. In my opinion, we need to include a principle in the law that universities can be allowed to organize college-level training within universities," the Minister commented.

However, the Minister also made it clear that the training and requirements need to have separate, specific regulations to avoid universities "massively enrolling college-level students", which would neutralize and reduce the enrollment capacity of colleges.

"The law cannot be too detailed about these contents. The law defines a principle that "it can be opened", "who can be opened and how, the Government will decide" - said the Minister.

Source: https://laodong.vn/giao-duc/bo-truong-nguyen-kim-son-sap-toi-chi-con-3-4-truong-cao-dang-su-pham-1619100.ldo