New Minister of Education: "The important task is to create trust"

“I believe that education is not a battle, education is people. It is a large project that is continuously built over many years (…). My important task is to create trust. Only when society has trust in education will there be victory, but when there is no trust in education, it is still a failure.”

Those were the shares of Professor Phung Xuan Nha in his first meeting with the press as Minister of Education and Training.

New Minister of Education and Training Phung Xuan Nha. Photo: Zing.vn

The goal of education is humane people.

- Sir, the Minister of Education and Training is always a very hot seat. In the next term, the education sector has the important task of implementing Resolution 29 on comprehensive and fundamental education reform. Former Minister Pham Vu Luan considered this a big battle, what about you?

Minister Phung Xuan Nha:Any citizen has very legitimate aspirations such as getting a good education, living happily, and living in a peaceful society.

I was assigned this task [Minister of Education and Training - PV] but I did not really focus on that pursuit, which is not right, because the nature of education is people, not degrees, and certainly not intermediaries such as programs, textbooks...

But human pursuits are very personal. Even the poorest people have the pursuit of a peaceful life. Criminals themselves do not want to be criminals, but are forced by circumstances.

Therefore, criminal education is the tip, not the root. The root is education to limit the bad and increase the good.

The goal of education is to train truly humane people, according to UNESCO: learning to know, learning to do, learning to be, learning to live together.

The goal of education is not in the program, textbooks or jobs, the goal of education must be people. Society needs people as the final product of education.

Talking about a fundamental shift from knowledge transfer to capacity development is great, but if we don’t go into the content, it will be empty. Everyone knows we need to shift, but the question is how to develop?

I start from the reality of listening to human needs. All people have the desire to have a better and more humane life. From that need, we turn to education. But education alone cannot do it, it must combine school, family and society.

Why do you blame education? Where is society? No matter how hard education tries, if the social environment and community do not really accompany it, they can only comment and complain.

Make demands on people, not textbooks.

Minister Phung Xuan Nha: For a long time, people have spent a lot of effort talking about curriculum and textbook innovation, but that is the story of teachers, the story of schools. With the goal of training people like that, what should teachers do? That is a professional job. Why bring up teachers' professional work for society to discuss?

There are jobs that only people in the industry discuss among themselves. There are jobs that the whole society discusses. Don't confuse the two.

Just like journalism. We cannot know everything about journalism. But journalism must guide public opinion or make society better. And how to achieve that is journalism's job.

The task of education in the coming period is to implement the project of comprehensive and fundamental education reform. (Photo: Quy Trung/VNA)

Make demands on people, not on curriculum and textbooks, because that is the job of teachers and schools. If teachers cannot meet output targets, textbooks will not solve anything. It is just an intermediary step in management, in the process, not the goal.

For example, after finishing high school, students have basic knowledge, are obedient, loving, orderly, and disciplined. But from vocational training onwards, it must be professional. Thus, general education educates people, it is the place to nurture and create the foundation from which people can follow this or that profession, some become doctors, some become workers... All are equal, respect each other, there can be no case where a professor looks down on a worker.

If we look at the division of labor, we will treat each other better, more tolerant, more respectful, but looking at the lower class, it is different.

I approach it that way, not about what the curriculum and textbooks are. That is the task of the deputy ministers and department heads.

I do not think education is a battle, education is people, it is a big project, built over many years.

If we do it like a campaign, we will finish it and then stop. People are not campaigns, people are not winners or losers. I believe that there is no such thing as winning or losing. Our important task is to create trust. Only when society has trust in education will we be victorious. If we do not have trust in education, we will still fail.

- How will you build that trust, Minister?

Minister Phung Xuan Nha:Trust must be built with awareness.

But before making society believe, the people in the profession must believe. Many teachers are very sad, very thoughtful, and have low self-esteem. Now we must instill pride and excitement into millions of teachers, and even instill shame (if any) to make millions of teachers excited.

Don’t scold or criticize, teachers are “soul engineers”, they are very sensitive, more sensitive than artists, when they are sad, how can they “compose”? Therefore, teachers must be encouraged and motivated.

Thank you, Minister./.

According to Vietnamplus