What did the Deputy Minister of Education and Training say?

At the regular government press conference on the afternoon of August 5th, Deputy Minister Hoang Minh Son emphasized that, in the context of a difficult economic situation, the government has set the goal of stabilizing the macroeconomy and controlling inflation. Therefore, not increasing tuition fees helps to reduce the burden on the people.

Regarding the concerns of universities after three consecutive years without increasing tuition fees, Deputy Minister Son said that tuition fees are the main source of revenue for universities, accounting for 50-90% of total revenue, and not increasing tuition fees in the 2023-2024 academic year is a major challenge for them.

Universities play a crucial role in providing high-quality human resources and scientific and technological resources, and have the mission of implementing one of the three strategic breakthroughs. This is also a field that has been significantly impacted over the past three years by the COVID-19 pandemic and other issues, and is under pressure from global competition.

Deputy Minister of Education and Training Hoang Minh Son.

On the other hand, tuition fee policies (Decree 60 and Decree 81) have not yet been implemented. Resources for higher education institutions have not increased for the past three years. Given rising prices, this poses a significant challenge in retaining faculty and teachers.

To support universities, the Ministry of Education and Training is striving to ensure recurrent funding for higher education, but has not yet implemented a roadmap for pricing higher education services. The Ministry will also propose to the Government a policy to support universities facing difficulties, such as not increasing tuition fees for three consecutive years, similar to the support provided to businesses.

The decision not to increase tuition fees for the 2023-2024 school year will not significantly impact general education, as this is not the main source of revenue for this level of education. General education is a welfare program, funded by the State budget; therefore, the Deputy Minister of Education and Training hopes that localities will pay more attention to ensuring teachers can work with peace of mind, and to overcome and minimize the phenomenon of teachers quitting their jobs.

Previously, many universities complained about the difficulty in balancing their finances because for three consecutive years the government had required them not to increase tuition fees.

Furthermore, the universities also stated that, starting from July 1st, the Government increased the basic salary for civil servants, public employees, and lecturers to 1,800,000 VND/month, a 20.8% increase compared to the previous basic salary of 1,490,000 VND/month. To meet the general salary increase policy for lecturers, the universities will have to budget tens of billions of VND more annually.

While tuition fees haven't increased, the salaries of lecturers and staff have risen, leaving the school's budget increasingly strained.

To cope with this difficult situation, most universities have decided to drastically cut back on non-essential activities, conferences, and seminars, reducing spending to maintain teaching and research operations, with maintaining stable salaries for faculty being the most important priority.

No increase in tuition fees for the 2023-2024 school year.
At a meeting on the draft amendment to Government Decree No. 81 on July 29, Deputy Prime Minister Tran Hong Ha requested the Ministry of Education and Training to finalize the draft decree soon and submit it to the Government before August 8, 2023.
The decree needs to be amended to clearly stipulate certain provisions regarding the non-implementation and non-application of the tuition fee collection and management mechanism. In particular, the Deputy Prime Minister requested that tuition fees not be increased for the 2023-2024 academic year.

Ha Cuong - English

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