Proposal to award Labor Medal to students who won international prizes

This is the content of the draft decree regulating the reward regime for students who win prizes in national and international competitions and national and international vocational skills competitions that the Government has just announced to collect comments before promulgation.

According to the report of the Ministry of Education and Training on the construction of a new decree, the regulations on the reward regime for students are currently implemented according to Decision No. 158 issued in 2002. This is the highest form of reward from the State for students with a reward level higher than the minimum wage at the time of the decision's issuance.

However, after 15 years of implementation, the reward for students with high achievements in national and international competitions for excellent students is no longer consistent with the reward level and reward regime.

At the 2nd session of the 14th National Assembly, a delegate commented that currently the awards and bonuses for excellent students at the national and international levels are very low, while the awards and bonuses for athletes are very high.

Members of Vietnam's 2017 International Mathematical Olympiad team.

Regarding the subjects of rewards, according to the Ministry of Education and Training, current regulations only stipulate rewards for students who win prizes in competitions for excellent students, national Olympics, international Olympics, national vocational skills and international vocational skills. However, in the current period, along with training in academic and key knowledge, the education sector needs to focus on the fields of scientific research, applied training and practice.

Therefore, it is extremely necessary to supplement rewards for students with scientific and technical research and applications, and achievements in other specialized training at national and international levels, and it is necessary to develop additional reward systems.

Regarding the form of reward, Decision 158 stipulates that the forms of reward for students at most scales and ranks are all in the same form, which is the Certificate of Merit from the Minister of Education and Training (only Gold Medalists are awarded a Certificate of Merit by the Prime Minister).

According to the Ministry of Education and Training, the same form of reward as above does not guarantee the principle of achievement, reward to that level. Moreover, the scope of influence of the awards that students achieve has a big difference between the international scope, the Asia, Southeast Asia region and the national scope; between the form, ranking of the Gold and Silver Medals and the Encouragement Prizes.

Forms of rewards according to the new draft.

Regarding the reward level, the Ministry of Education and Training said that the current regulation is high compared to the basic salary in 2002 which was 210 thousand VND. However, compared to the current reward level, the reward level for students who won national and international prizes has decreased.

Specifically, the bonus for students winning international Gold Medals is reduced from 71 times the basic salary (VND 15,000,000 bonus compared to VND 210,000 basic salary) to 12 times the current basic salary (VND 15,000,000 bonus compared to VND 1,300,000 current basic salary).

The bonus levels gradually decreased sharply until the final level was 400,000 VND for students who won third prize in the national excellent student competition, accompanied by a Certificate of Merit from the Minister, which was nearly 2 times the basic salary in 2002. Currently, it is only equivalent to 0.3 times the basic salary and equivalent to the lowest bonus level of the current regulation, which is a certificate of merit.

Therefore, the Ministry of Education and Training believes that amending the regulations in Decision 158 is necessary to suit actual conditions and also in accordance with the Law on Emulation and Commendation issued in 2003 and amended in 2013.

According to Vietnamnet