User:Marty Hoare/sandbox/Vietnam's ESL Sector: A Quagmire of Disappointment

Vietnam’s ESL Sector: A Quagmire of Disappointment. Vietnam, April 2021.

Introduction

English as a Second Language (ESL) is a global industry that has morphed into an enormous sector, much of which disappointingly is driven by the allure of the all-powerful dollar. It is a sector inhabited by unprincipled operators ravenous with an appetite for effortless financial gain. Expectant students (funded mostly by ill-informed parents) are more often than not the casualty of this habitually disreputable industry. Although the sector also has its genuine actors, the entire industry is saturated, swamped if you will, in a quagmire of distasteful players.

I speak from the position of a mature-age professional educator having had many years of involvement in the global English language sector of which 13 have been spent in South East Asia. Despondently, I do not proffer much optimism, if any at all, for the English language education of students in this region.

In the first half of 2020 the annual English Proficiency Index report (EF EPI 2020)1 was published with less than satisfactory results for South East Asia. The report is based on the test results of 2.2 million English second-language speakers in 100 countries and regions from across the globe. Not surprisingly this year’s shining star was the Netherlands coming in at No.1 out of 34 European countries and also first out of the 100 countries tested. But alas, in South East Asia, and more specifically Vietnam, even after untold millions of dollars of investment (and I use the word investment sparingly), proficiency results for Vietnam are far from flattering. Along with other reasons which I will discuss later, this in itself is a sad indictment of the ESL sector in Vietnam. A news article penned by Nguyen Quy in November 20202 on Vietnam’s falling proficiency ranking, explained a low proficiency level as “an individual only being able to navigate an English-speaking country as a tourist, engage in small talk with colleagues, and understand simple emails”.

Background

With a growing population of approximately 100 million people, Vietnam is often referred to as the next Tiger Economy. This Tiger Economy mantra has been harmonized since the mid-1980s and continues to be vocalized through to present day. Even with the arrival of Covid-19 early in 2020, Vietnam’s melody of advancement continues to be heard loudly across the globe. Yet, due to the flood of questionable press, sponsored economic reports, and expensive consultancy hyperbole - all underpinned by glossy marketing brochures, the realities of Vietnam’s rapid expansion into the 21st century, and hence seemingly remarkable inroads into the global economy, make the reality of the exact state of affairs in Vietnam anyone’s guess. Much like the ESL industry in Vietnam, authenticity in this part of the world is often masked behind a veil of duplicity. In spite of this there is no arguing that Vietnam has seemingly progressed from a mostly agrarian insular society to one of a developing nation rhetorically unified under one flag. Of its 100 million people and after 4 decades of growth, it is understood that 70% are rural dwellers with the remaining 30% spread across 2 major cities. These now mega-cities heaving under the pressure of inadequate infrastructure, mass overcrowding, increasing pollution, and ever-present corruption, include Ho Chi Minh City and its capital Hanoi, with the central coastal city of Danang rapidly becoming a significant regional entity. It is also understood that in the order of 30% of Vietnam's 100 million people are under the age of 24, often referred to as the next generation. With these numbers is it any wonder that the ESL industry in this part of the world is thriving?

English Language Education in Vietnam In Vietnam, English is a compulsory subject from 3rd grade onwards. Students in Government schools are mostly taught by under-qualified Vietnamese English teachers with little to no English proficiency. Of course, the external English language centre business (also flooded with unqualified and ill experienced teachers), accounts for a large number of foreign teachers. But literally hundreds of thousands of poorly equipped Vietnamese teachers using archaic methods of grammar exercises, often reproduced from out-dated and poorly photocopied texts, and vocabulary cramming, present to scores of disenchanted students. Public classrooms across Vietnam are stretched to breaking point under the weight of 30, 40, 50, and even 60 or more students in each classroom. Due to the lack of quality education delivered in classrooms across Vietnam, many parents send their children to after school classes, commonly referred to in Vietnam as Extra Classes. Other than being little more than an opportunity for Vietnamese teachers to earn additional lucrative cash income, these extra classes have little to no impact on student outcomes as many of those delivering the content are less than qualified to do so. It is a vicious cycle and one that appears not to be slowing down. In Vietnam’s latest national high school exam results3the average English score was lowest among nine subjects. Recognizing that English language proficiency is a crucial component to the advancement of a Tiger Economy, the National Foreign Language 2020 Project was launched back in 2008. The NFL 2020 project was at the time the latest breakthrough designed to delve into new advancements to improve the quality of English language learning and teaching across all school levels in Vietnam. However, after nine long years and substantial investment, running into the many millions of dollars, the project has attracted considerable negative public attention and feedback from those concerned; no more so than from the then and recently re-elected Minister of Education and Training, Mr. Phung Xuan Nha who in November 2016 admitted that “the National Foreign Language Project 2020 had failed”.

The Numbers

Approximately 8 million elementary pupils, 5 million lower-secondary students, and 2 million upper-secondary students are enrolled at just over 15,000 elementary schools, 10,000 lower-secondary schools, 2,400 upper-secondary schools, and almost 1000 mixed schools throughout Vietnam. The exact number of Vietnamese teachers catering to this vast number of students is unclear. It is however estimated that there are approximately 260,000 educators up to tertiary level in Vietnam. But what is clear is that Vietnam is facing a calamitous teacher shortage with little to no inroads being made into this critical challenge. The answer to the obvious question: where will the future teachers come from, remains a mystery. In 2008 Harvard researchers Valley and Wilkinson described the Vietnamese education system as “being in a state of crisis”5. As we end the first half of 2021, and after many millions of dollars have been gobbled up by the system, the state of crisis highlighted twelve years earlier remains.

A Corrupt Sector Corruption in Vietnam is well publicized. In 2020 Transparency International ranked Vietnam as the 36th most corrupt country out of 179 countries in their Global Corruption Perceptions Index6. Transparency International considered education as the second most corrupt sector in Vietnam after the police. Bribery to ensure university admission or grade improvements is commonplace. It is also common practice for parents to pay bribes to teachers and or school administrators. In a recent highly publicized case, a senior government official was found to be a significant perpetrator in the alteration and falsification of exam candidate’s answer sheets in national high school examinations.

Other widely reported problems include plagiarism in higher education, the fraudulent acquisition of academic degrees, manipulated budget estimates and the leakage of funds from public procurement projects -The National Foreign Language Project 2020 as a case in point. Teaching materials and construction of facilities, payments to service providers for items such as training and professional development courses and etc. all contribute to the vast amounts of leakage. These forms of corruption not only gravely impact educational outcomes, but they continue to have a devastating bearing on Vietnam’s educational quality. In November 2020 an investigation by the Ministry of Public Security revealed that Dong Do University Hanoi had granted 626 bogus English bachelor’s degrees8 and as recently as February 2021 a police raid in Ho Chi Minh City uncovered a forgery ring responsible for the production of fake medical and teaching certifications. National Foreign Language Project 2020 Stage 1 of The National Foreign Language Project 2020 ended in 2020. It is unclear where the funding for this multi-million-dollar project came from, how or where funds were allocated, what the funds were actually spent on, or how much of it, if any, actually remains. Transparency International would suggest that a considerable portion of those funds would have been lost to leakage. And, one thing most people agree on is, that the NFL 2020 Project was a consciously calculated manipulation of difficult to secure financial resources with mostly no measurable outcomes or auditing follow-up. And further, when speaking to any Vietnamese teacher regarding the state of education in Vietnam, you will be greeted with an avalanche of abhorrence. Recently, through a process of face-to-face interviews conducted in private with Vietnamese educators, 100% of respondents courteously voiced their dissention at the entirety of the system, with the larger majority of interviewees scoffing at the suggestion that during their many years of teaching any inroads into the state of education have been met. On pressing candidates further, all stated emphatically that the NFL 2020 Project was nothing more than an opportunity for the powers-at-be to line their own pockets - only confirming Transparency Internationals’ reporting on the endemic corruption within Vietnam’s education system.

Two Sides to a Story Here we are faced with a dichotomy of judgment. On the one avaricious hand we have Vietnamese English teachers arguing that it is their system that has failed them and their students, while on the other equally cash adoring hand we have the authorities who would have us believe that it is their teachers who are contributing to the cesspit of sludge that is Vietnam’s education sector. As the authorities clearly stated in their Vietnam Education and Training Development Strategy, “all levels have not caught up with the reality of education and training development as people are influenced by their own personal benefits”. Another case in point is the more recent renewal, or continuation of the NFL 2020 Project. The Vietnamese Department of Education and Training, under the stewardship of Mr. Phung Xuan Nha, who back in 2016 declared the project a failure, has recently completed its second attempt to develop Vietnam’s 1000s of English teachers. This most recent initiative called for the IELTS (International English Language Testing System) to be the focus of the professional development of approximately 4000 Vietnamese English teachers where they would partake in a 15 week long intensive IELTS preparation course. On course completion, Vietnamese teachers would sit an official IELTS exam where they would receive a certification based on the IELTS assessment criteria. The assessment criterion measures the reading, writing, listening and speaking ability of candidates resulting in an overall band level being awarded. Globally recognized as an international entrance level requirement for universities, the IELTS has become synonymous throughout the ESL world; some would argue, only adding more sludge to the cesspit of the sector. Leading up to Phase 2 of the NFL 2020 Project the Department of Education and Training (DOET) called for expressions of interest from various ESL service providers. Attracted by the allure of effortless dollars as mentioned above, a number of service providers eagerly submitted their proposals, met behind closed doors with officials where they presented glossy presentations to departmental heads; many lacking any real pedagogical depth of knowledge and or experience, and most who struggle to converse in basic English. Robust negotiations were conducted, with contracts for services subsequently agreed upon with an array of questionably suitable ESL stakeholders, including of all people, the bastion of everything involving English language learning across the globe, the British Council. Although what appeared to be a well-orchestrated attempt to redeem some of what was lost over the previous 9 years, the outcomes of the more recent course, as predicted, were less than satisfactory, only confirming the data collected from the English Proficiency Index Report 2020. And further, also confirming Transparency International’s reporting on the nefarious activities that continue to neuter Vietnam’s education arena. A Comedy of Errors An autopsy of phase 2 of the already failed 2020 project unfolds like a comedy of errors where what appeared to be a determined attempt to save face was made to stave off the authenticity of the skills, abilities and proficiency of Vietnamese English teachers, and as was to come to pass, together with a much-maligned continuation of the unashamed leakage of funding. The first intake of 400 Vietnamese English teachers were given notice that they were to sit an initial IELTS exam prepared in surreptitious harmony by the Hanoi University and the British Council at the IELTS examination centre located away from prying eyes just outside of Hanoi city. English teachers, many who had never even heard of the IELTS, mostly with no prior preparation for the exam whatsoever, sat the incredibly tedious exam and on completion were given a band score. In week one of the 15-week course it became ever so obvious that the allocation of band scores was overstated. Students arrived at the 15-week preparation course with band scores far exceeding their actual ability. Failing Proficiency Exposed Entering the course students were streamed in to levels 1 to 3 depending on their band score and were introduced to the formalities of sitting, what instructors understood to be, an authentic IELTS exam, on completion of the course. It quickly became apparent that the Vietnamese teachers’ English proficiency across the board was far below not only the official IELTS assessment criterion but also that of the English Proficiency Index 2020 report. Once the realization that entrance scores were extremely liberal, the task of preparing Vietnamese English teachers for the official IELTS exam began. Putting aside the blatantly obvious overzealous entrance results, over the first 7 weeks of the course instructors worked painstakingly to prepare their underprepared students for round 1 of their first of two-practice simulated IELTS exams. The outcome of the initial exam proved to be disturbing. Students that entered the course with a certain IELTS band level were found to be at a considerably lower level. Listening and reading skills were distressingly low with writing skills taking a close second. Although most students could, as stated by Nguyen Quy in 2020, navigate an English-speaking country as a tourist, engage in small talk with colleagues, and understand simple emails, the scene was set for a catastrophic outcome, not to mention a tremendous challenge for instructors. Practice IELTS exam 1 not only highlighted the level of skulduggery at play in the IELTS training centre, in keeping with the accepted norms of Vietnam, it also clearly highlighted just how appalling proficiency levels actually were. Vietnamese English teachers, some of whom had been plying their trade for more than 10, 15 and 20 years, and in some cases more, were devastatingly under qualified to be teaching English to scores of wide-eyed students, especially those in their formative years as well as those preparing for tertiary studies. Of the 40 questions on both the IELTS reading and listening exam the majority of students struggled to answer 20 correctly with many students receiving raw scores as low as 4 out of 40 on both exams. Of the two writing tasks, 150 words and 250 words respectively, most students displayed a less than satisfactory ability to paraphrase the topic statement, construct an intelligible sentence, write a cohesive paragraph, or complete a brief summary conclusion on either of the two writing tasks. Their biggest challenge was with vocabulary and hence, comprehension; their level of which can only be equated to that of an early high school student or lower. Confronting Inadequacies The results of the first simulated IELTS exam set the tone for the remainder of the 15-week course. Students were unjustifiably disillusioned due to the authenticity of their results and, right on cue, went out of their way to demonstrate their baseless irritation after being confronted with their own inadequacies. The demeanour of the students continued to deteriorate over the remaining 5 weeks of the course leading up to the second practice exam scheduled for week 11. As a result, absenteeism rose dramatically, excuses such as the course book is no good, the course is no good, teaching methodology is no good and the ever present, I’m too busy for this, became the catch-cry of most students on the course. Students also turned-on instructors. As is often the case in Vietnam, by their logic and reasoning, it was the fault of the instructors as to why their general lack of ability was exposed for all to see. The well documented attitude of saving face in this part of the world took on a life of its own.

The initial seven complaint-free and extremely engaging weeks of the course were instantly brushed aside by a choir of hard to ingest truths of collective shortcomings. The deterioration of attitudes over the remaining five weeks of the course grew in intensity. Students who were being paid their salary whilst attending the course, together with miscellaneous out-of-pocket expenses for items such as lunch and transportation, arranged with local support staff to falsify their course attendance. This ensured that students would receive their entitlements whether they were in attendance or not. In week 10 of the course, the week leading up to final exams, Teachers’ Day was celebrated in Vietnam. This one-day celebration hijacked the course and became a weeklong celebration where lunches and photo-shoots and changes of traditional dress took precedence over final exam preparation. Practice exam 2 was held in week 11 resulting in similar bleak results as practice exam 1. However, in slight defence of the students, the DoET had shifted the goal posts at the last minute. In their wisdom, even after surveying students to see if they preferred paper or online exams, made the decision that practice exam 2 would be conducted online. Due to the poor computer skills of students, this change only added to the overall disastrous results of practice exam 2 with reading, listening and writing skills showing little if any noticeable improvement. Although everyone involved on the course felt that the speaking skills of most students had in fact improved, both exams 1 and 2 only worked to highlight how grossly underprepared Vietnamese English teachers were to be teaching English. Towards the end of the course the ever-present issue of corruption, although customarily well masked from the public eye, was to raise its ugly head. As previously mentioned, the course was originally designed to be delivered over a 15-week period. Students were expected to attend classes 3 days each week for 6 hours a day. This was to equate to 45 days of instruction for the duration of the course. However, due to let’s say, unforeseen circumstances, the start date of the course was delayed therefore reducing the course length from 15 to 14 weeks or 42 days of instruction per student. In week 12 of the course instructors received an email from management with a request to fraudulently falsify internal documents. The email reads as follows: “.. Admin support staff will ask you to sign a course attendance document. This document will state that the course took place over 50 teaching days. This was the original planned length of the course and this attendance record is necessary in order for Centre XXXXXXX to get paid by DoET. While they are aware of us shortening the course, the reasons behind it & etc. they still require a document that states 50 days of tuition”.

This request for instructors to falsify documents can only be related to finances. If the audit trail was not as it should be, the final payment for delivering the course would be at risk. Instructors were left with no option other than to falsify the document out of fear of not being paid their contractual monthly remuneration for the course. The actual length of the course ended up being 13 weeks for a total of 39 student days. Without knowing the exact cost per student per day it is difficult to calculate the value of the missing 11 days. However, even working on a bare minimum of 400 students multiplied by 11 days at $50 per student per day the leakage could be in the vicinity of USD 250K. As there were multiple service providers delivering the same project, this number multiplied by the number of other service providers, could easily exceed USD 1M. If the cost per day per student was closer to $100 per day, leakage would be in the many millions. Towards the end of the course all of the instructors commented on the poor attitude of participants. The general consensus was that the majority of Vietnamese English teachers did not want to be on the course and saw no value in it whatsoever.

Candidate Feedback Most of the candidates stated quite openly that they felt the academic nature of the IELTS preparation course and the exam itself was unnecessary for them to ply their trade. Most students voiced how they would have much preferred to have been instructed on modern pedagogical practice with a focus on vocabulary and speaking skills. Whether their claims are warranted or not are open for debate. However, and from experience, it became painstakingly obvious that the course was above their capabilities. The harsh realities of a general lack of ability were uncovered but not acknowledged. The realization that their system had failed them once again, coupled with the uncomfortable truth as to the waste of valuable financial resources, only resulted in a further decline in attitude. Having completed the IELTS preparation course the Vietnamese English teachers attended the Hanoi University IELTS training centre where they sat the official IELTS exam. Due to the authenticity of assessments, it is anyone’s guess as to the legitimacy of exam results or outcomes. As the IELTS preparation course came to a close, instructors were approached once again to falsify documents. Initially, entitlements were paid to instructors by way of a direct deposit to their respective bank accounts with amounts paid and any tax obligations being transparent. Some instructors were advised that final payments would have to be collected in cash. As a result, it is not unreasonable to assume that nefarious activities were once again at play. Whether this was to mislead the project administrator or for the purposes of tax evasion, or both, remains anyone’s guess.

The Cost of Education in Vietnam As reported by Thi Thai Ha Tran in 201610, basic education comes at a high cost in Vietnam. There are far too many types of school fees and contributions, in addition to schooling fees in numbers and under names that vary widely with localities. The HIDE Survey 2013 identified 15 major groups of fees (including on and off school fees): enrolment and tuition, construction and repair, purchasing equipment, class fund, textbooks and stationery, uniforms, canteen, parking fees, supplementary classes at school, extra classes outside of school, insurance, parents’ association funds, and gifts and envelopes for teachers. Tran also added that schools are under equipped and teachers poorly paid. Parents pay construction and maintenance fees meant to cover school capital expenditure which is often used elsewhere. Teachers collect various types of contributions, which are far from negligible, with the collection methods often bordering on harassment. And further, it is common place for teachers to make available to families, their skills and time to help students improve their academic performance against a payment shared between the school and teachers whereby desperately needed school classrooms are provided for extra classes. These supplementary classes proliferate fast as growing numbers of students can therefore pretend to attain higher education levels. Supplementary classes appear as a way to offset what families see as teaching weaknesses and poor education quality. More often than not, extra classes are nothing more than an opportunity for gluttonous teachers in cahoots with even more gluttonous school administrators to appropriate additional income. As reported in Vietnam's Education and Training Development Strategy 2016, widespread extra tuition and learning are not for the learners' benefits but teachers' incomes, increasing student enrolment size in order to further increase income, the buying of qualifications, the selling of marks, the misuse of budget allocations and tuition fees, all negatively influence on schools' and teachers' prestige. Furthermore, HIDE Research 2016 also exposed that while funds do not serve the common interests of the school or of a particular class, some of it is used in the furtherance of well-connected individual students. And, the system setup to mobilize funding for basic education has not had an entirely positive impact on school management or educational outcomes.

A Lucrative Business Vietnam’s education sector is an extremely lucrative market. Driven by an increasing interest in education from both local and international investors, this trend is consistent with education being regarded as the second-most attractive sector in Vietnam with two main factors driving this growth. The first being the increasing number of middle-income earners in Vietnam and the second being the failure in the number of public schools to rise in line with an increased population. Moreover, parents want to equip their children with more soft skills that are not offered in public schools, and the private sector is stepping in to meet this demand. Whilst foreign entities, governments, scores of AID organizations, NGOs, and banks continue to fall over each other to throw vast sums of money at Vietnam’s second most corrupt sector, the cesspit of sludge will only deepen with students remaining the most affected by this shadowy industry. The sector can only be described by using a well-known idiom; Pigs get fat and Hogs get slaughtered. The cesspit of sludge that is the Vietnamese education system has most definitely fattened the pigs and, if left unchecked, will most definitely continue to slaughter the hogs.