Sharing a set of textbooks, not wasting the sets of books that have been 'worked hard to make'

The government regulates free textbooks.

On October 11, the National Assembly's Committee on Culture and Social Affairs held its third plenary session to comment on draft laws related to education .

Regarding textbooks, the draft Law amending and supplementing a number of articles of the Law on Education stipulates that the State shall provide a set of textbooks for uniform use nationwide. The Government shall stipulate free textbooks for students; at the same time, it shall implement appropriate socialized solutions for textbooks, ensuring sustainability and meeting the requirements for improving the quality of education.

Along with that, the National Council for Textbook Appraisal will be regulated and established by the Minister of Education and Training for each subject. The Council and its members are responsible for the content and quality of the appraisal.

Expressing her opinion, National Assembly delegate Nguyen Thi Viet Nga (Hai Phong) said that when implementing the policy of a common set of textbooks, it is necessary to propagate so that people can clearly see the adjustments in each stage to suit reality.

According to Ms. Nga, the progress of implementing a set of common textbooks is very urgent, along with that, there needs to be caution, responsibility, and quality assurance of the textbooks. Ms. Nga noted that in the process of compiling a set of common textbooks, attention should be paid to the content of reducing the curriculum.

This proposal was made by delegates, while there were still complaints from people and many teachers and experts about the curriculum not being reduced, and even heavier in some new textbook sets.

In fact, there is a gap between the requirements of the program and the time allocated for teaching in class. If only teaching according to the program, the time allocated in class cannot fully and thoroughly teach the content, which then creates the need for extra teaching and learning.

The Hai Phong delegation also noted the need to limit waste with existing textbooks that have been appraised and put into teaching when implementing a common set of textbooks.

"These are books that have been compiled quite elaborately, so when there is a new book set to be shared, the ministry also needs to have a solution for the existing book sets of organizations and individuals to avoid waste," said Ms. Nga.

How to choose textbooks at provincial level?

Also at the meeting, National Assembly delegate Nguyen Anh Tri (Hanoi) acknowledged that the policy of a multi-textbook program, while beneficial, could be said to be "almost a failure, not successful".

Mr. Tri proposed to amend the regulations in the direction of the Ministry of Education and Training to organize a national drafting council and a national appraisal council. Because according to him, the national drafting council has not been mentioned yet, this has caused chaos in some periods, drafting a set of books that are not standard and have many errors.

*There are solutions for the textbooks currently in use because they have been worked hard to produce.*

Regarding this content, Chairman of the Committee for Culture and Society Nguyen Dac Vinh said that a program with many sets of textbooks has made a lot of progress but in practice there are many difficulties. The policy of having a common set of textbooks is expressed in the draft law, but the drafting agency has not completely revised it when there is still a provision assigning the provincial People's Committee to choose textbooks.

From there, the question arises, how to choose? If it is shared, this responsibility must be transferred to the ministry - not only to evaluate but also to set out regulations on what constitutes shared textbooks? Mr. Vinh suggested that there must be a plan for the textbooks currently in use because they have been worked hard to create.

In addition to the content put into common use, the remaining documents are also intellectual products, with great reference value for teachers and students. Therefore, they should not be banned, but left as reference documents to help parents, teachers and students have access and encourage the development of educational documents.

Receiving and explaining, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Van Phuc affirmed that the draft law will institutionalize the content of using a unified set of textbooks. At the same time, the drafting agency will review the content related to the compilation of the set of textbooks in sub-law documents.