Soliciting for seats at “star” schools – no remedy yet
Though state management agencies well know that the movement of soliciting for seats at “star” schools is undesirable, they still cannot find any solution for the problem.
When local newspaper Tien Phong questioned an official from a local education and training sub-department about what to do to stop this trend, he said that he does not think anyone can answer the question. 
Under the current regulations, students have to go to primary school in the districts where they live. Primary schools must accept children from the same localities and they have the right to accept students from other districts if the schools have seats.
In order to minimise soliciting for schools, the Hanoi Education and Training Department has asked “star” schools to reduce the number of students who come from other districts. However, analysts have pointed out that this will not help. It will make the race fiercer as parents will pay bigger sums of money when the quotas decrease.
In Ba Dinh, Dong Da and Hoan Kiem districts, the districts’ authorities meet leaders of desired schools every enrolment season, discussing measures to stop soliciting. However, the meetings seem to bring nothing, as the soliciting has become more and more serious.
Organising competitions, why not?
Educators have suggested that general schools be allowed to organise competitions to select students. Competitions would allow them to select the best students in a transparent way, and help minimise wrongdoings.
However, among secondary schools, only the
Headmasters of general schools say that they themselves do not like the current mechanism because they have to accept many students just because they are the ‘descendants of influential families’.
The Dong Da district’s Education and Training Sub-department several times has asked the Hanoi Education and Training Department to allow schools to organise competitions, but they were refused.
Officials from the Hanoi Education and Training Department said that in general, the system of state-owned secondary schools in Hanoi has enough seats for all students, and this is the main reason they believe there is no need to organise competitions to select secondary school students.
“All students who finish primary education and have good health have the right to follow secondary education at schools in their localities,” said Nguyen Thanh Ky, head of the Secondary and High Education Department under the Hanoi Education and Training Department.
The official said that they had heard about the soliciting for seats at famous schools, but they said that it is very difficult to uncover cases.
According to Ngo Van Chat, Deputy Head of the Examination Education Teaching Management Division, the decentralisation mechanism has been applied in enrolment, which means general schools have the right to decide to enroll students, and the city’s education department does not intend to interfere in schools’ affairs.
VietNamNet/TP
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