Many new points in the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Higher Education

The Ministry of Education and Training has just announced the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law.Higher Educationto collect comments before submitting to the Government. Notably, the draft proposes issues on the organizational structure of the university and plans for recognizing the president and vice presidents.

The draft Law project consists of 10 chapters with 36 amended and supplemented articles out of a total of 73 articles and 12 chapters of the Law on Higher Education, aiming to expand the scope and enhance the effectiveness of higher education autonomy, improve the governance capacity of higher education institutions as well as innovate training management to ensure quality, efficiency and approach international standards.

Particularly for issues with different opinions such as the organizational structure of universities and the recognition of presidents and vice presidents, the draft Law proposes options for collecting opinions.

Not every province has a university.

Regarding the general provisions, the draft amends important articles such as Article 9 on university stratification and ranking, Article 11 on university network planning and Article 12 on State policy on university education development.

The draft revised and supplemented Law on University Education has many new points.

Article 9 on stratification and ranking is amended and supplemented in the direction of promoting the autonomy of higher education institutions to develop according to their own strategies and in accordance with the conditions and needs of each stage. Regulations on ranking are amended and supplemented in the direction of creating more competitive motivation between universities, improving the quality and efficiency of higher education institutions' operations, providing information to interested individuals and organizations.

Article 10 on the planning of the network of higher education institutions was amended and supplemented to institutionalize the Party's policy in Resolution No. 19, which is to shift from planning by administrative unit to planning by sector, field, social and market needs, and for higher education: Merging, consolidating or dissolving universities that are not operating effectively; not every province must have a university. The amended and supplemented contents are to ensure compliance with the Law on Planning.

Article 12 on investment policy for higher education is amended in the direction that the budget for higher education is implemented through projects, programs, student credit policies and training and scientific research orders to meet the country's development requirements.

The policy of ordering training and scientific research is implemented according to the principles of competition and equality, regardless of the type of higher education institution. The draft also stipulates that higher education institutions implementing socialization are given priority in land allocation without payment or land lease to build schools, and are exempted from value added tax, corporate income tax and import tax on equipment and machinery serving training and scientific research activities.

In addition, additional provisions on research institutes established by the Prime Minister are allowed to train at doctoral level according to the provisions of this Law.

The school board elected the principal.

In the section on organization of higher education institutions, supplement the structure of enterprises in the organizational structure of universities and academies specified in Article 14; and higher education institutions with 51% or more capital of foreign investors are allowed to decide on their own organizational structure.

The University Council represents the owners of the stakeholders. Other regulations on the University Council are amended and supplemented to suit the university autonomy in the current practical context as well as in the coming years.

For private universities, clearly distinguish between the Board of Directors of private universities and private universities operating on a non-profit basis. At the same time, remove the provision on “representatives of local management agencies where the higher education institution is located”.

On the organizational structure of the universityAs stipulated in Clause 3, Article 15, the draft offers two options to choose from: The first option is that in universities there will be "schools" and "research institutes" and not "member schools" or "member research institutes". The second option is that in universities there will be "member schools" and "member research institutes".

The Ministry of Education and Training believes that this is an issue with different opinions in the process of drafting the law and needs to consult the Government. However, the Ministry proposes the first option based on the common practice in the world, the multidisciplinary university model is called University in English. In terms of administration, multidisciplinary universities often have a 3-level structure: University level, school level and equivalent (College, Faculty, School) and department level (Deparment).

Draft Law expands the scope and enhances the effectiveness of university autonomy.

The non-regulation of the term “member” in the university model as stipulated in Clause 3, Article 15 aims to promote the advantages of multidisciplinary universities, which is to mobilize the combined strength of the entire system to solve the enormous tasks of training and scientific research that a specialized university cannot undertake.

That is: creating opportunities for each lecturer to delve into their expertise, allowing students to choose to study with the best teachers, allowing the school to open interdisciplinary training and research programs as quickly as possible, meeting the requirements of science and technology in the context of the 4.0 industrial revolution.

The governance mechanism in universities in the draft Law partly clarifies the role, functions, tasks and powers of the University Council in public universities. In particular, the provisions clearly define the governance and management functions between the University Council and the Principal in each higher education institution.

On the recognition of principals and vice principals, in Article 16 and Article 20 regulating the Principal, the draft also gives 2 options. The first option is that the School Council organizes the election process and submits it to the Ministry of Education and Training for recognition, and the second option is that it will be recognized by the competent management agency.

This is also one of the issues with many opinions, so the Ministry of Education and Training also wants to ask for the Government's opinion. However, the Ministry proposed option 1 because the draft stipulates that the University Council is the governing body, the highest authority in the university, so the University Council exercises autonomy in electing the principal and submitting the election results for recognition by the Ministry of Education and Training, in order to implement unified State management of higher education, monitor standards as well as the implementation of legal regulations for leadership positions in higher education institutions, and carry out fundamental and comprehensive innovation of higher education throughout the system.

The Ministry of Education and Training does not interfere in personnel work and the process of electing principals and vice principals of the school board. The Ministry only recognizes if the file is checked and it is found that all prescribed procedures and standards have been fully implemented, in order to manage the title of principal on the basis of common competency standards throughout the system.

Universities proactively decide tuition fees

The Ministry of Education and Training believes that the implementation of university autonomy shows that financial regulations in higher education are still not suitable. Therefore, the draft amended and supplemented Law also stipulates many issues in the direction of giving more initiative to schools.

Regarding tuition fees, higher education institutions have shifted to regulating training service prices to comply with the Law on Prices and the Law on Fees and Charges. Higher education institutions have the right to proactively develop and decide on training service prices according to the Government's regulations on training service prices, ensuring that they are commensurate with training quality. Training service prices must be publicly announced for each school year and course along with the enrollment announcement.

Regarding regulations on financial management of higher education institutions, the draft stipulates that public higher education institutions that are autonomous in regular expenditures, investment expenditures, or autonomous in regular expenditures, with a resolution approving the policy of the school board, are allowed to use financial resources in deciding on investment projects using the legal revenue sources of the higher education institution and other legal sources mobilized by the higher education institution itself.

Decide on the use of capital, assets and brand value of the school to cooperate with organizations and individuals to conduct training, scientific research and technology transfer according to the principle of preserving and developing state capital and assets. Decide on the content and level of expenditure from tuition and career revenue sources, funding sources for ordering and assigning tasks, including salary expenditure, professional activity expenditure, management expenditure and is stipulated in the internal expenditure regulations of the higher education institution.

The draft also stipulates the opening of training majors in the direction of clarifying the right to autonomously open majors and higher education institutions are allowed to open majors when meeting quality assurance conditions such as being recognized as meeting quality accreditation standards for higher education institutions, having a resolution approving the policy of opening majors by the school council, board of directors and meeting the conditions for opening majors according to regulations to be autonomously open training majors at university and master's levels; except for the group of majors in health and national security.

Regarding enrollment quotas and organization, the revised and supplemented enrollment quotas are determined by training majors based on socio-economic development needs and human resource development planning, in accordance with the conditions on quantity and quality of teaching staff, facilities, and other quality assurance conditions; and higher education institutions autonomously determine enrollment quotas, publicly announce enrollment quotas, training quality, and training quality assurance conditions of higher education institutions; ensuring output quality meets social needs.

According to Dantri