A unified set of textbooks: A historic push to create educational equity

The shift to a unified national textbook set is a strategic decision, demonstrating the long-term vision of the Party and State to achieve the core, long-term goals of education.

Using a unified set of textbooks is a decisive milestone for the future of education . (Photo: Ba Hai)

Untangling the knot from practical inadequacies

Resolution No. 71-NQ/TW (Resolution 71) of the Politburo on breakthroughs in education and training development requires the use of a unified set of textbooks nationwide. This is a correct decision, with long-term significance, affecting the future of Vietnamese education.

This is also considered a turning point of historical significance, aiming to create fairness, quality and social consensus through education. It clearly demonstrates our Party's viewpoint: Education must be a tool to contribute to strengthening the great solidarity bloc, building Vietnamese people to develop comprehensively, eliminating all the huge differences in the quality of education between regions.

The policy of "one program, many textbooks" under the 2018 General Education Program was initially expected to create healthy competition, diversify learning materials and improve quality. However, the implementation has revealed undeniable limitations and shortcomings, becoming barriers to the even development of education.

Having multiple sets of textbooks leads to a significant dispersion of resources. From appraisal, teacher training, printing to book selection at schools, everything becomes complicated and expensive. Teachers face great pressure when having to research, compare and prepare lesson plans for multiple versions of books, significantly reducing the time spent on innovating teaching methods and interacting with students.

Although following the same curriculum, the differences in the way of expression, examples, exercises and knowledge structure of the textbooks have created a lack of uniformity. This makes it difficult to standardize the quality of teaching and learning, especially in the construction of common exams, such as the high school graduation exam. This difference can easily cause controversy about fairness, because students studying according to different textbooks may encounter certain advantages or disadvantages when approaching the common exam.

In addition, the policy of many sets of textbooks has unintentionally increased the differentiation in the quality of learning materials between localities. Many people believe that the regulation of a set of textbooks used uniformly nationwide is a good solution to ensure fairness and suitability to the reality of Vietnam, but it is necessary to add flexibility for ethnic minority and disadvantaged areas.

"The decision to use a unified set of textbooks nationwide is a historic push, demonstrating the strong determination of the Party and State in creating a strong and fair education system."

Sharing with the World and Vietnam Newspaper, National Assembly Deputy Nguyen Thi Viet Nga, member of the National Assembly's Culture and Social Affairs Committee, said that after a period of implementing "one program, many textbooks", we have gained experience and learned many valuable lessons. However, this model also revealed shortcomings, especially the difference and lack of consistency in teaching practice.

Resolution 71 proposes the solution of “a unified set of textbooks nationwide” to overcome that situation, while still ensuring flexibility through open sections for localities and schools to supplement appropriate content. In other words, this is not a denial, but an inheritance and adjustment, so that the textbook model is more suitable to current practice and development requirements.

According to Ms. Nguyen Thi Viet Nga, the education sector needs to focus on three words: "quality": quality of programs and textbooks, ensuring they are scientific, modern, and linked to practice; quality of teaching staff so that they truly become the soul of innovation; quality of educational administration, meaning it must be transparent, effective, against achievement-based disease, and especially student-centered.

Demonstrate foresight

The shift to a unified set of textbooks nationwide is a strategic decision, demonstrating the Party and State's long-term vision to achieve the core, long-term goals of education. First , ensuring unity in the national value system. Textbooks are the most important tool to convey core values, history, culture, revolutionary ideals and national identity.

The decision to use a unified set of textbooks affirms the principle: Education must contribute to strengthening social consensus and building comprehensively developed Vietnamese people. A unified set of textbooks, compiled and strictly censored, will create a common knowledge system for all Vietnamese students. This is especially important in the current context of globalization and information diversity.

Second , the most important goal of unification is to ensure fairness in access to high-quality education. A unified set of textbooks will be invested with the highest level of resources to compile, becoming the minimum quality standard that all students can enjoy. Unifying textbooks is the most powerful measure to eliminate quality differences between localities. When all students have access to the same standard source of materials, their development opportunities will be much more equal.

Third , concentrating resources on a set of textbooks helps the Ministry of Education and Training easily manage and control the quality of core content, ensuring the authenticity and standards of the knowledge imparted. When there is only one set of textbooks, teacher training will be implemented more synchronously, closely and effectively, avoiding the situation where each locality and each school has to deal with many different versions of books. This helps teachers have more time and enthusiasm to focus on innovating teaching methods, aiming at the goal of developing learners' capacity.

National Assembly Deputy Nguyen Thi Viet Nga commented that the move from the policy of using many sets of textbooks to a unified set aims to overcome limitations and shortcomings. (Source: National Assembly)

For the Resolution to be effectively implemented, there needs to be a scientific implementation roadmap and consensus from the whole society. The biggest challenge is how to ensure that the unified set of textbooks does not become rigid. The new set of textbooks must be designed in an open way, encouraging teachers' creativity. Unifying textbooks does not mean one-way teaching methods. Instead, it is necessary to create a quality knowledge framework that allows schools and teachers to flexibly apply additional reference materials and diversify teaching methods to suit regional characteristics and student capacity.

At the same time, the compilation of a unified set of textbooks must be a combination, inheriting the advantages of current textbooks, eliminating inappropriate content. This process must be carried out transparently, publicly, and widely consulted with scientists, teachers, parents and the whole society to regain trust, ensuring the highest objectivity and scientificity.

In addition, there needs to be a detailed, systematic plan, with the support of pedagogical universities, to ensure that teachers not only understand the content but also master the teaching methods, conveying the innovative spirit of the unified book series.

From his perspective, Associate Professor Dr. Bui Manh Hung, Chief Coordinator of the 2018 General Education Program Development Board and Editor-in-Chief of Literature Textbooks, believes that the process of compiling a unified set of books requires careful preparation and cannot be done hastily.

The new set of books needs to be upgraded and innovated; AI only supports a part, the core is still the intelligence and enthusiasm of the team of authors; a serious attitude is needed, avoiding the mentality of meeting administrative deadlines while overlooking the quality of learning materials. Before starting to compile, it is also necessary to review and adjust the 2018 General Education Program based on teaching practices and the opinions of teachers and experts.

It can be said that the decision to use a unified set of textbooks nationwide is a historic "push", demonstrating the strong determination of the Party and State in creating a strong, fair and democratic education system. It is a turning point that clearly demonstrates the viewpoint: Education must be the foundation to strengthen social consensus, ensuring that all Vietnamese citizens are equipped with a uniform system of values ​​and knowledge standards.

The unified set of textbooks will help shape a generation of citizens with a solid foundation of knowledge. The success of this decision requires the consensus, support and close supervision of the whole society to turn the right policy into a brilliant achievement, opening up a bright and sustainable future for education.

Recently, the Politburo issued Resolution No. 71-NQ/TW on breakthroughs in education and training development. In particular, for general education, the Politburo requested to review and evaluate the implementation of the General Education Program; ensure the provision of a unified set of textbooks nationwide, strive to provide free textbooks to all students by 2030; at the same time, synchronously implement solutions to overcome the widespread situation of extra teaching and learning.

Source: https://baoquocte.vn/mot-bo-sach-giao-khoa-thong-nhat-cu-hich-mang-tinh-lich-su-kien-tao-su-cong-bang-giao-duc-329592.html