The Process Of Adaptation Of Contemporary Vietnamese Higher Education To The Rise Of A Knowledge Economy
21st century has witnessed the accelerating pace of globalization accompanied by the concomitant development of information and communication technologies, leading to the increasing demand for a highly skilled workforce in a knowledge-driven economy. A knowledge economy, according to Powell and Snellman (2004), is driven by information- and data-intensive activities that have accelerating pace of obsolescence and innovation. To put it simply, a knowledge economy operates on the basis of data and information gathering, collection, manipulation and dissemination. The emergence of knowledge economy has shifted the global economy from agricultural- and labor-intensive economies to the ones functioning based on intellectual capabilities rather than on physical inputs and natural resources. For that reason, among the skills needed to compete for the best jobs in a knowledge economy, three stand out: social networking, adaptability and entrepreneurship (Ferrante, 2015).
According to Marginson and Van der Wende (2006), higher education sector has been most influenced by these impulses hence, play the central role in producing the educated workforce to meet the societal demands. Since the adoption of the renovation program Doi Moi in 1986 after declaration of independence in 1975, higher education system in Vietnam has gone through substantial changes and experienced many positive results such as the increase in literacy rate and the number of people receiving formal education. However, under the constant pressure from a relentlessly evolving knowledge economy, Vietnamese tertiary education is still lagged behind in the process of adjustment. This paper will revolve around the question what challenges are hampering the process of contemporary Vietnamese higher education adapting to the rise of a knowledge economy and analyze the factors hindering this process of adaptation, namely outdated curriculum, institutional problems in structure and management, brain drain and inappropriate governmental policy. Take a look at the contemporary academic curriculum in Vietnamese higher education and examine why it tends to lose momentum in a knowledge economy.
In a knowledge-driven economy, according to Ferrante (2015), students enjoying the learning environment which underlines flexibility, application and creativity are at an advantage compared to those burdened by rigid learning and rote memorization. Current Vietnamese higher education seems to be following the later model. Firstly, the current curriculum focuses too much on theory and complicated formulas without showing what, why, when and how these concepts are applied to reality and operated in practice. Moreover, knowledge in textbooks are no longer applicable to what is happening in reality and not being able to catch up with the rapid development of information and technologies. Within the curriculum, 25 percent is attributed to mandatory courses about political indoctrination which serves little or no practical use when students enter the competitive job market. Graduates end up being no more than ‘systematized robots’ memorizing and thinking inside a box. Surveys conducted by government-linked associations have found that more than 50 percent of university graduates do not manage to secure jobs within their areas of specialization (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008). Reddy (2012) attributes the low number of graduates unable to find jobs related to their disciplinary majors to the fact that they are unprepared, therefore require special training to fulfill the prerequisite of the industry before being ready to step into the labor market. This statistic has indicated the discrepancy between what the curriculum offers and what economy and society really need, pointing out the obsolescence of the current academic curriculum in Vietnamese higher education. Secondly, the lack of orientation is to blame for the failure to prepare students well for a knowledge-driven economy.
At school, students are offered no official skill or orientation courses guiding them how to effectively and strategically study, how to manage time properly, how to strike a balance between academic, social and personal life to make the best use of their college experience. This leads to many students not adopting positive attitudes when attending colleges. A survey conducted by a Vietnamese press agency in 2017 shows that only 30 percent of students pursue college due to a genuine request for knowledge while more than 60 percent of students go to university just to pass exams to earn a degree. Thirdly, academic freedom in Vietnamese education is limited in which debate and discussion are not promoted. Most Vietnamese universities use the lecture-based approach in which students just go to school and write down all the lecturers say then go home and learn it by heart. Students are expected to follow all the instructions from teachers and obey them unconditionally. This passive learning approach not only deteriorates students’ genuine interest for knowledge but also fails to equip students with essential skills to compete and survive in a knowledge-driven economy.
According to Nguyen (2008), characteristics such as independence, critical thinking and the ability to work collaboratively in a team setting are highly valued by employers but fail to be performed by most of Vietnamese students. English competency is also of great importance in the era of globalization, however academic curriculum at most universities fail to equip students with it. This is illustrated through Intel’s struggles to hire competent engineers to take up manufacturing facilities in Ho Chi Minh City. When the company conducted a standardized evaluation test of 2000 Vietnamese IT graduates, only 90 applicants, or 5 percent had met the requirement, and out of this group, only 40 candidates who are sufficiently competent enough in English to be employed (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008). Intel indicates that this is the worst outcome that they have confronted in any country that they have invested in. This example, once again, reaffirms the irrelevance of the current teaching program to the requirement of labor market and the socio-economic need of the country. In another picture, institutional problems in management and structure are also responsible for the difficulties that Vietnam is encountering to adapt to the rise of knowledge economy.
Firstly, university operation and management systems are non-transparent and selecting and recruiting teachers are too often based on nepotism, family and political status and relationships rather than based on merit (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008). This has resulted in not only a decline in quality of teaching and education but also an impediment to producing the competent workforce that Vietnamese society and economy demand. Secondly, many administrators and executives at universities take advantage of the fallacies in management system to make money from the people who pay bribes to gain admittance to their favored schools or who buy diplomas and degrees. This phenomenon is increasingly common in recent years in Vietnam as society has perceived the university degree as the key to getting a well-paid job and gaining social status. This conception, however, is invalid in a knowledge-intensive economy which emphasizes knowledge generation and dissemination rather than an ‘empty’ degree. As long as the misconducts of bribing and selling-buying degrees persist, Vietnamese higher education is still lagged behind the movement of knowledge-based economy which emphasizes real knowledge and real skills. Thirdly, over-focus on examinations and grades still dominates teaching and assessment in Vietnamese higher education.
Accordingly, some teachers and lecturers take advantage of this to earn additional wages. Teachers, in many cases, only deliver half of the curriculum in regular classes at school, then ‘force’ students to pay for private courses to cover the remaining part of the curriculum, or ‘pressure’ students to take extra-classes to secure good grades at school (Vu, X. N. H. , Ngo, M. T. , Ta, M. T. , & Nguyen, M. T. , 2011). Students who do not take extra classes end up with poor grades. It is not uncommon that teachers sell the answers of the exam questions to students or leak the exam questions for students who take extra classes. These malpractices not only lead to the degradation of social and moral values but also jeopardize the future of students in the long term. An outstanding degree with full straight A’s but no genuine knowledge in mind and skills in practice will not help students to survive in an increasingly competitive knowledge economy. Last but not least, lack of transparency in allocating and utilizing funds offered by state budgets for innovating the quality of teaching and infrastructure is to blame. Many cases show that university officials collude to embezzle the money which is meant to upgrade the facilities, buy more books for the library or build the research center. These fraudulent behaviors have deprived students of the opportunities to enjoy a better quality of education and better learning environment.
Brain drain is posing major obstacles in Vietnamese higher education’s efforts to adapt to the rise of a knowledge economy. According to Merriam-Webster Dictionary, brain drain refers to ‘’the departure of educated or professional people from one country to another for better pay or living conditions. ’’ The phenomenon of brain drain is recently prevalent in Vietnam in which most of brightest and most potential high school graduates opt for top Western universities to pursue their undergraduate degree. The case is similar for master and PhD students. Most importantly, after completing their studies, these students choose to remain in the host country instead of returning back to ‘serve’ their country. There are many reasons for this trend; however, the biggest motive is students’ dissatisfaction with the domestic affairs such as corruption, nepotism, polluted environment and poor health care system. Other major reasons may be reverse culture shock and limited opportunities in terms of funding for academic research and job prospects. In recent years, government has been carrying out policies to attract students to return; however, these efforts seem to be not enough. Vietnam is in the process of adaptation to the emergence of knowledge economy and the dynamic and competent young workforce may be the key answer. Therefore, it is an obstacle that these bright and potential students choose to stay and contribute their intellectual capabilities and efforts to the development of the host country rather than their home country. On a macro level, one possible explanation for Vietnamese higher education’s struggles to adapt to the knowledge economy can be traced back to inappropriate and ineffective policies from government. Firstly, government fails to make use of national budgets and resources in the proper and strategic way. Statistics indicate that Vietnam’s expenditure in education occupy more than 20 percent of total GDP, being the largest spending of national budget of all sectors and higher than any countries in the Southeast Asian region.
However, Vietnamese higher education is being left behind by even its undistinguished Southeast Asian neighbors such as Thailand and Philippines, let alone prestigious ones such as China, South Korea and Taiwan. There is not a single university that has ever appeared on the popular ranking tables of Asian leading universities (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008). Most of national budget invested in education is all poured down to reformation. In Vietnam, reforming education is going on an ‘endless’ basis and wasting huge costs of money, time and resources; however, little changes have been made rather than an even more complicated and fragmentary system that is already ‘crippled and devoid of vitality’ (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008). Secondly, Vietnamese universities are strictly controlled by the highly centralized system of government. This approach is problematic in the sense that it deprives institutions and universities of the autonomy and denies them the opportunities to compete and innovate (Vallely & Wilkinson, 2008).
According to Niedermeier and Pohlenz (2016), autonomy is of great importance for academic institutions because it not only releases the creativity and innovativeness of scholars and administrators but also facilitates universities to adopt strategic management practices for the best possible quality of their provision. Vietnamese universities have been calling for financial autonomy and independence from accreditation systems so that they can solve their own problems on the institutional level. At the beginning of 2018, Vietnamese government has ratified the proposal allowing national universities to be financially autonomous; however, no positive results are produced. Most institutions even raise their tuition fees at least 20 percent, posing major constraints on impoverished children who desire to pursue college. Moreover, the centralized system may cause foreign investors’ hesitation to set up their international modules in Vietnam because they will not exercise the full control over their institutions. Until now there is only one foreign institution, RMIT university, operating autonomously in Vietnam without being much influenced by government control. Other forms of foreign investment mostly exist under the name ‘partnership programs’. However, these programs seem to lose their international characteristics since they have to transform the ‘international’ into ‘domestic’ model to be able to operate in Vietnam. The centralized system, therefore, is questionable because we are in the era of globalization and Vietnam is in need of assimilation to international orientation to be able to compete in a knowledge-driven economy. Thirdly, teachers and lecturers at universities are underpaid. They do not seem to earn enough to ensure a decent life if they only rely on their official salaries.
As a result, they do not demonstrate full commitment to teaching and delivering lessons at school or even some of them resort to making more money in dishonest manners by ‘forcing’ students to take private tutoring or ‘pressuring’ students to take extra classes to secure good grades at school. These malpractices not only lead to the decline of quality of teaching and education but also, in the long term, put students’ future in jeopardy as they are not equipped with sufficient knowledge and skills to thrive in a knowledge-driven economy. Overall, the rise of knowledge economy has brought about many benefits as well as challenges. To be able to adjust to this movement, contemporary Vietnamese higher education needs a comprehensive reflection of its setbacks and fallacies and consciousness of what major challenges are lying ahead. It is time for people who are both, directly and indirectly, involved in the higher education system to be fully aware of how severely and negatively outdated curriculum, institutional problems in structure and management, brain drain and inappropriate governmental policy have hindered the process of Vietnamese tertiary education adapting to the knowledge-based economy. On the class-based level, academic freedom should be promoted which gives more room for debate and discussions.
By that way, students can actively engage in learning activities without relying solely on teachers. On the institutional level, the effectiveness of current academic curriculum needs to be carefully re-evaluated and adjusted in order to proportionately cater for the demands from the economy and labor market. Structure and management in universities and institutions need to be transparent and devoid of corruption to ensure the delivery of sufficient knowledge and skills to students. Selection and recruitment of teachers needs to rely on merits and qualifications rather than on nepotism, relationships or family and political background to ensure the quality of teaching and formal education. On the national level, the government should adopt a strategic and long-term vision in policy-making, for instance, in terms of how to make the best use of national budget to reform education, how to tackle corruptions in education and how to attract the professionals studying abroad return back to Vietnam. This paper analyzes the four major challenges that Vietnamese higher education is facing in the process of adaptation to the rise of knowledge economy, therefore a compelling possibility for further research might be on how these challenges can be tackled from different perspectives.
