To 'socialize' education is always a humane policy

At the same time, it is necessary to be transparent in using support resources from social activities to both create consensus in society and help mobilize resources to serve the cause of education and training.

Artificial football fields are the dream of poor students in rural areas and have now come true in Nam Dan district. Photo: CSCC document

Socialization of education is a humane policy, aiming to mobilize social forces to join hands to contribute to the development of education using two resources: Material resources (financial resources, material resources, human resources, land, etc.) and non-material resources (supporting educational policies, creating a unified educational environment, spiritual factors supporting education, educational consulting, exchanging information and educational experiences, etc.).

That is the positive meaning. But unfortunately, in reality, many school leaders have not bothered to think hard and find ways to exploit different resources, but only try to mobilize contributions from parents by all means, at all costs, regardless of right or wrong.

Because schools know, most parents, for many reasons, easily agree to the amount of money set by the school, even though the amount is quite large compared to their income. The largest is the school construction contribution. In addition, there are many expenses that are not really necessary for the learning process of their children, some other expenses are not on the list of expenses allowed by the Ministry and Department to collect, but parents are still forced to "voluntarily".

Thus, the situation of overcharging in schools still exists openly under the name of “agreement” and “voluntary”. Some schools even pre-print “Application for voluntary contribution” as the most effective shield to deal with current regulations.

Many parents say: "Exempting tuition fees for high school students in public schools means nothing when the additional fees are many times higher. There are study support fees, security fees, physical education teacher fees, English tuition fees, second-session teaching fees, sanitation funds, youth activity funds, Red Cross funds, library support funds, facilities support funds, and even salaries for... supervisors, computer fees, parking fees, drinking water fees, air conditioning installation fees, electronic contact book management fees. Some schools even mobilize parents to contribute money to build basketball courts, buy projectors, upgrade computer systems, plant trees... most of which are collected in various forms of "support", "mobilization", "contribution".

The press once published a bitter saying of a parent in Thua Thien Hue a few years ago that:“We just have to grit our teeth and do whatever the school is like. Our children study there and depend on the teachers. If the teachers get angry, our children will be affected.”.

That is why at the beginning of this school year, when a secondary school in Thu Duc, Ho Chi Minh City announced that it would not collect any funds, especially that parents who wanted to sponsor the school had to have written consent from the Department of Education and Training, it caused a stir on social networks and received public attention. A seemingly normal thing has become abnormal. Especially when the socialization of education is transforming into rampant overcharging in schools.

The Ministry of Education and Training once issued Circular No. 16 detailing that the socialization of education must have a specific plan, a request for permission from the competent authorities (local leaders, leaders of the local education sector) before implementation. Funding for education must ensure the principles of voluntariness, publicity, transparency, no regulation of average funding level, no regulation of minimum funding level, no exploitation of funding for education to force contributions and no consideration of funding mobilization as a condition for providing education and training services.

However, in reality, principals rarely do this because they are afraid of the complexity and are not sure whether their superiors will agree or not. Therefore, they often "borrow the hand" of the Parents' Association to send open letters or call for help.

While the state budget is limited, socialization to mobilize social resources for education is the right thing to do. The problem is not to abuse the socialization policy, not to count heads and divide sticky rice, equalize the contribution level for all parents because of targets and competition. In the 2019-2020 school year, Quang Xuong I High School (Thanh Hoa) collected 90,000 VND from each student to prevent and fight the Covid-19 epidemic; then collected 700,000 VND from each student for socialization, 300,000 VND from the Parents' Association fund... clearly overcharging; or Le Chan High School in Hai Phong in 2022 collected 1 million VND/parent whose child applied for grade 10, to have 1 billion VND.contract to "build a 250 KVA transformer station" for the school.

Recently, Huynh Thuc Khang High School, Vinh city, mobilized socialized education funding with an estimated amount of more than 2 billion VND.VND to renovate the 4-storey classroom building that had deteriorated. However, the controversy after the incident in which parents accused the homeroom teacher of class 12 D1 of insulting and disparaging students related to the collection of socialized money of 1.2 million VND/student showed that the school did not properly implement the spirit of Circular 16.

Nghe An is a locality that has done well in the socialization of education. In recent years, many schools have carried out many meaningful projects from socialized sources such as purchasing physical facilities, equipping televisions, pull-up boards, building swimming pools for students or awarding scholarships to poor students. It is worth mentioning that this socialization is not mobilized from parents but from the help of organizations, individuals, and children far from home who care about education. In Thanh Chuong, there are Nguyen Canh Chan High School, Thanh Chuong 3 High School; Nam Dan District thanks to socialized funding of 6 billionDong is the leader in the province in building artificial football fields for 23/23 primary schools in the district... Nghi Loc 2 High School built an 800m2 swimming pool, completely socialized by former students of the school...

In addition to providing material support, schools also connect with a number of businesses to create conditions for poor students to borrow money for university; School unions mobilize philanthropists, organizations and businesses to sponsor thousands of free meals for poor students, helping them have the opportunity to go to school...

Socialization of education is a correct policy, in the context of limited state budget investment in education. However, for this work to be effective and meaningful, it is necessary to be thoughtful, transparent, creative and flexible in the implementation of schools. Let society see the pure heart and dedication of teachers to the cause of education so that "socialization" is truly a humane way of doing things, a place to demonstrate the voluntary spirit of organizations, individuals and philanthropists interested in the cause of education in our country.