Rising to the status of "leading bird" in the North Central region

(Baonghean) - Selected by the Ministry of Education and Training as one of the seven centers for training and fostering teachers and educational managers nationwide, Vinh University has been contributing to making a mark for Nghe An on the path to becoming a fairly developed province of the country as set out in Resolution 26 of the Politburo. In addition to key pedagogical training majors, the school also provides the province and the whole country with a quality workforce in many diverse professions and fields.

In the late 80s of the 20th century, grasping the trend of development not only in depth but also in breadth of society, the Party Executive Committee of the 22nd term of the school determined to turn the school into a multidisciplinary training center, in which pedagogy was identified as a traditional strength. That was a very correct step in the context of a modernized and industrialized society, opening up new professions and new needs in the labor market. But at the same time, this door also opened up many challenges for Vinh Pedagogical University - because diversifying training requires a large scale of facilities and equipment as well as a team of lecturers at a wide range, while ensuring depth for teaching quality.

With determination and sense of responsibility for the construction and development of the whole society, Vinh University has achieved many remarkable achievements in the task of training diverse and high-quality human resources. With 50 undergraduate training majors, 31 master training majors and 15 doctoral training majors, by September 2014, the school had nearly 42,000 students, international students, trainees and postgraduates. Over the past 55 years, the school has trained 97,134 bachelors and engineers; 7,907 masters and 177 doctors.

Graduation ceremony of Vinh University students. Photo: TL

In 2013, a new task set for Vinh University in Resolution No. 29-NQ/TW is to fundamentally and comprehensively innovate education and training, meeting the requirements of industrialization and modernization in the conditions of a socialist-oriented market economy and international integration. This is a “dual” task because Vinh University not only needs to innovate and reform teaching and learning methods in the school but also play a proactive role in the general education reform, because the school is the place to train pedagogues - the key factors for comprehensive education innovation.

For the task of improving the quality of direct training at school, the key solution is to innovate teaching methods in the direction of promoting practicality, practice and developing capacity and thinking. Some specific solutions include: eliminating the graduation thesis and 2 modules replacing the graduation thesis for the bachelor's program, instead increasing the volume and duration for vocational skills training or scientific research; changing the goal and method of testing and evaluating learning outcomes from the ability to reproduce knowledge to assessing qualities and formed capacity depending on the training industry's goals; Investing in facilities, smart classrooms connected to the network of schools, businesses, and factories to ensure a consistent training roadmap before, during, and after leaving school;… Improving foreign language proficiency is set as an important task, with the Project “Improving the quality of teaching and learning English at Vinh University”, contributing to training students from the 54th course (2013) to achieve 3/6 according to the 6-level foreign language proficiency framework for Vietnam.

A new feature in the teaching at Vinh University is the integration of English teaching into some courses for students of faculties such as Mathematics Education, Physics and Technology, Biology, and Chemistry. This ensures that students graduating from basic science majors have a full foundation to approach and interact with world science.

Experimental hour of Chemistry students - Vinh University. Photo: Thanh Le

Dr. Nguyen Xuan Binh - Head of Training Department of Vinh University said: "Converting the single-disciplinary training model to multi-disciplinary, that is the first reform on a large scale. Improving the quality of education, increasing the connection with social reality and the times, that is the second reform on a deep scale.

The two major changes in the 55-year history of establishment and development of Vinh University, although different in method, are both aimed at one task, which is to train a workforce that meets the needs of society in a certain development context. That is the reason why the operational orientation of Vinh University is always closely linked to each stage.

Specifically, based on the orientation of developing the province towards industrialization, modernization, attracting investment and promoting the revolution of bringing science and technology into all production fields, the task set for Vinh University in the coming period is to promote training in science and technology. On the basis of the school's facilities, equipment and teaching staff, the relationship with businesses will be further tightened, adapting the supply and demand for labor quality. In addition, the traditional key industry - teacher training - will continue to be focused on, contributing to making Nghe An become the cultural and educational center of the North Central region as the goal set out in Resolution 26 of the Politburo.

In the context of society's increasingly high demand for quality human resources, the increasingly diverse development of the education and training system inside and outside the province, new challenges are opening up for Vinh University - the leading bird in teacher training in the North Central region and a reliable "address" in the post-secondary training handbook of parents and students inside and outside the province. To maintain and promote the recognized teaching and learning foundation, to contribute to making the tradition of studiousness of the land and people of Nghe An spread further and longer, Vinh University will constantly move, integrate into the rotation of the times. Modernization on the basis of traditional thinking but still maintaining the values ​​of the times: Education and training are the roots for the comprehensive and sustainable development of society, and at the same time are a mirror reflecting the practical needs of each stage on the path of construction.

Thuc Anh