Minister of Education and Training, Pham Vu Luan said that it would not be considered a “disaster” if students nowadays rush to learn foreign languages and informatics, while they pay less attention to literature or history.

Minister of Education and Training, Pham Vu Luan

Luan, in the interview given to local press agencies on the sideline of the ongoing National Assembly’s session, admitted that few students want to follow social sciences studies, and that the marks in history at the university entrance exams are too low, which is the problem that needs to be solved. However, Luan believes that this is the problem of not only Vietnam, but of the whole world.

He said that in order to build a “solid foundation”, it is necessary to make investment for tens of years. Sometimes, things are being done today, but the achievements can be enjoyed only by the next generations. He stressed that it is necessary to keep calm to analyse the education.

Hundreds of students got zero mark from the latest university entrance exams. What would you say about that?

University entrance exam is the competitive exams. Therefore, the exam questions should be designed in a way which allows to classify excellent, good, or weak students. The low marks in history are the problem of the computer age.

Therefore, you can see that the phenomenon is also taking place in the US and many other countries in the world as well, not only in Vietnam. Students now do not want to study history, because the social science does not have much voice in the modern life, while the students good at history do not have many opportunities to find good jobs.

Informatics is really a hard subject, and it is not attractive to every one. However, without information technology, people cannot live in the modern society. Therefore, people have to learn informatics. Meanwhile, they can find the opportunities to have high income with the informatics knowledge. Therefore, though it is a hard subject, people still rush to learn it and find it interesting.

Everything depends on the era where you are living in, and depends on the development tendency. History has become less attractive, and the marks in history have decreased. This is not only the story of Vietnam or Asia alone. This is the story of the age, of the current generation, and this has been created by the technology revolution, by the changes and the demands of the labor market.

But experts have pointed out that it is the problematic teaching method which does not encourage students to learn history?

It is true. However, we should not only blame on the teaching method. I think that the main goal of teaching history is to help students understand the national traditions and foster patriotism, national pride and sense of responsibility. If we just ask students to remember knowledge today, they will forget tomorrow.

I once discussed with Historian Duong Trung Quoc about the plan to join forces with the History Institute to change the current teaching method. However, it is really not a simple task. We need to make comprehensive changes, including the goals, curriculums, contents and teaching and learning methods.

You have said that history has become less attractive because of the tendency in the modern times. What would you explain the fact that Vietnamese people and students know Chinese history better than Vietnamese history?

I agree with the note, but this is not the story of the education. This is a social story. Vietnamese people have knowledge about Chinese history not because we teach Chinese history at schools, but because they watch many Chinese historical films or read Chinese stories. You should not make mistakes here. It is not happen that Vietnamese students learn Chinese history and then love Chinese history.