10th grade exam in Vinh city: Narrow door to public school
(Baonghean.vn) - Increasing the enrollment quota for public 10th grade is the desire of many parents and students in Vinh city. This is even more urgent when this year, the number of students taking the 10th grade entrance exam in the area has increased dramatically with more than 800 students.
"Narrow door" to public sector
A year ago, with more than 21 points, 0.5 points short, Ms. Thu Huyen's daughter (Hung Loc commune, Vinh city) was forced to transfer to Nguyen Truong To High School - a non-public school in Vinh city. With tuition fees higher than public schools, this was really difficult for the family.
Sharing about this, Ms. Huyen said: “I really regret that my child’s Math and Literature scores were very good and only a small mistake in the English test caused him to lose the opportunity to enter a public school. This score would have been much easier if he had been in another locality…”.
Ms. Huyen's family is in a very difficult situation because last year her husband suffered a serious stroke and was thought to be dead. For nearly a year, not only did they have to take care of her husband who was hospitalized at a high cost, but her family also had to shoulder the burden of paying for their child's education. That is also the reason why, although her child's test scores were good enough to enter the advanced program at a public school, she and her family were forced to give up because they could not afford it.
Quick meals on the bus are no longer a strange thing for Ms. Hue Anh and her child (Vinh Tan ward - Vinh city) since her child started the race to enter 10th grade. Every day, the busy schedule of classes and extra classes has made her child have no time to rest.
In many school sessions, her child has to run 3-4 shifts, exhausting not only the child but also the parents. To ensure her child's health, she often cooks at home and puts it in a box, taking advantage of the time between school sessions, her child often eats right on the bus so as not to be late.
As a math tutor at a tutoring center in Vinh city, teacher Chu Quoc Hung said that he really feels sorry for his 9th grade students, because almost every class has a student who is late because of "overlapping class times" or constantly rushing from one class to another. "This year, the number of students taking the 10th grade entrance exam has increased while the quota is small, so the competition for 10th grade will be more difficult. I really feel sorry for them, many days I buy extra bread and candy so they have more energy to study, some students ask the teacher to eat instant noodles. Many students study too much, their eyes are drooping when they come to class, we have to encourage each other to try harder," teacher Hung said.
Need to increase target
Vinh City is always a hot spot for 10th grade admissions and this exam is considered to be more "tough" than the university entrance exam. What is unfair to Vinh City students is that while many other localities in the province have very low entrance exam scores (less than 5 points/subject) and can still pass public schools, the entrance scores in Vinh City have a different gap.
As for the 2023-2024 school year, the highest benchmark score in district schools is Thai Lao High School (Hung Nguyen) at 19.35 points (first round), while schools in Vinh city are 22.6 points (Ha Huy Tap High School), 22.7 points (Le Viet Thuat High School) and the highest is Huynh Thuc Khang High School (25.35 points). The remaining schools, even the top schools in the districts, only fluctuate between 17 - 18 points.
The huge gap puts Vinh city students at a disadvantage in the race to get into public schools. This also leads to the paradox that students from district schools with many low scores are still admitted to public schools. Meanwhile, students in the city with high scores, sometimes more than 8 points/subject, still have to study in non-public schools.
According to many teachers and parents, the pressure of admission toGrade 10in Vinh city not only took place this year when the number of students in the whole city increased dramatically, with nearly 800 students, but has taken place for many years.
It is worth noting that although the number of students has increased, the quota for public schools remains stable as in previous years. Therefore, the pressure of the exam season next year will be even greater than last year.
I see that in Vinh city, the quota for public schools is too small, so the pressure to enroll students in grade 10 is very high. This is extremely disadvantageous and forces students to study a lot, in addition to studying the main subjects at school, they also have to study outside, there are specialized subjects that require 2-3 teachers.
Currently, in the whole province, Vinh city is the locality with the largest number of students taking the 10th grade entrance exam. In this year's 10th grade entrance exam, according to the summary, there are more than 6,000 students in Vinh city, 100 - 1,500 students higher than other districts such as Quynh Luu, Yen Thanh, Dien Chau.
The number of students is also almost twice as high as that of Thanh Chuong, Do Luong, Nghi Loc districts and much higher than that of other districts such as Tan Ky, Thai Hoa town, Nam Dan...
However, while the districts of Quynh Luu, Yen Thanh, Dien Chau, Hung Nguyen, Do Luong, Thanh Chuong each have 4-5 public schools, Vinh city only has 3 schools. This leads to a problem because in district schools, the public school passing rate is often 80-90%, while in Vinh city, this rate is only 55-60%.
Over the past two years, due to the increasing pressure of 10th grade enrollment in Vinh city, the Department of Education and Training and Vinh City People's Committee have considered opening a second campus of Huynh Thuc Khang High School. However, for various reasons, the expansion plan has not yet been implemented.
Faced with the above reality, many parents believe that, in this year’s enrollment season, the Department of Education and Training needs to calculate increasing enrollment quotas and increasing classes for public schools in Vinh City to reduce the pressure on enrollment at the beginning of the year and create fairness for Vinh City students. In addition, there needs to be a long-term solution to expand the scale of schools and classes to anticipate the rapid increase in students in the coming years, especially in years considered “good years”./.
