University Admissions 2025: Risk of Injustice from Difficult English Exams

Initially, the Ministry of Education and Training acknowledged that some exam questions were more difficult than others. However, this acknowledgement does not come with a commitment to ensure fairness for candidates, because how to handle it is related to university autonomy.

MATH : IF IT'S NOT DIFFICULT, IT'S DIFFICULT IN GENERAL

According to statistics from the Ministry of Education and Training, the whole country has 1,135,432 candidates (TS) registered for the 2018 General Education Program (GDPT), of which 1,132,132 candidates took the math exam (in fact, there were 1,126,700 candidates taking the exam, reaching a rate of 99.52%). Thus, with candidates registering for the 2018 GDPT Program, most of them registered for the math exam because it is a compulsory subject. Math is also a subject in 4/5 traditional combinations (A00, A01, B00, D01). Therefore, when applying for university admission, most candidates have to compete with each other in math.

If we consider the math component scores alone, with the admission principle of taking from high to low (competitive mechanism), the advantage always belongs to the candidates with higher math scores. Therefore, fairness (among candidates) depends on the level of differentiation of the exam. The higher the differentiation of the exam, the more fairness is guaranteed. Even if the exam is easy, the differentiation will not be good, which leads to the risk of injustice. Difficult questions, with few high scores, the standard scores of universities will decrease. As for candidates, difficulty is general difficulty, the ability to compete for university entrance (in math) of students will depend on where they stand in the list from top to bottom, not how important the score is (in relation to scores of other subjects or math scores of previous years).

Too difficult English test raises concerns about fairness in 2025 university admissions

PHOTO: TUAN MINH

According to many high school math teachers, the level of differentiation in this year's math exam is very good. Mr. Tran Ngoc Minh (Head of the math group, Quynh Luu 1 High School, Nghe An ) said that after the math exam, the school's excellent students were very happy. They believe that whatever they do will be recognized. Unlike last year, if TS was lucky, they could get an extra 0.5 points, and some students even got lucky up to 0.75 points. "In general, this year's math exam is a good exam. If we reduce a few ideas in the short answers, or the true and false answers so that average students can do a little more, they will be happier. But that will make it difficult for highly competitive universities to use high school graduation exam scores as a basis for admission," said Mr. Minh.

RISKS FOR CANDIDATES TAKING THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE EXAM

But nearly 358,870 candidates taking the English exam did not have that joy. The risk of unfairness in university admissions exists because they have to compete with candidates taking other elective subjects: history, geography, physics, chemistry, biology, computer science...

The uneven quality of exam questions has been a prominent issue every year since the Ministry of Education and Training launched the "2 in 1" exam (for high school graduation and university admission). There were also years when candidates who took a combination of English subjects benefited because this subject was easier than other subjects, but this year the situation is at risk of being reversed. After the exam, many candidates reported that the physics and chemistry questions were "easy", while the English questions were said to be difficult to the level of C1 (while the output standard is B1).

The issue is more tense than in previous years because this year, candidates taking the English exam do not have many options. From last year onwards, foreign language (mostly English) was one of the three compulsory subjects (along with math and literature). The optional subjects were a combination of social sciences or a combination of natural sciences (each combination of three subjects).

Therefore, if the English test is difficult, candidates can choose the subjects they have the highest score among the remaining 3 subjects in the social science and natural science groups. This year, if English is omitted, candidates will only have 1 subject to form another admission group. Students will almost have no chance to choose because the university admission group requires at least 3 subjects. In addition to the D01 group (math, literature, English), very few schools use a group with both literature and mathematics for admission.

According to the regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training, this year universities are not limited in how many combinations they can use for admission. When registering for admission, students do not need to register for any combination; the system's software will automatically select the most beneficial combination for them. But in reality, large universities limit the number of combinations as in previous years. The natural sciences, engineering and technology sectors mainly still use the combination A00, A01 (schools using D01 are usually in the lower group); the economics and business sectors also use D01. No student takes the English exam and also takes both chemistry and physics.

The uneven quality of exam questions has been a prominent issue every year since the Ministry of Education and Training implemented the "2 in 1" exam (for high school graduation and university admission).

Photo: Nhat Thinh

Is there any way to resolve the injustice?

At the press conference of the Ministry of Education and Training after 3 sessions of the 2025 high school graduation exam on the evening of June 27, Thanh Nien reporter asked: Does the Ministry of Education and Training have any technical solutions to ensure fairness for candidates taking the English exam in the admission process when they have to compete with candidates taking the physics, chemistry, history, geography, etc. subjects? However, the representative of the Ministry of Education and Training, Mr. Nguyen Anh Dung, Deputy Director of the Department of Higher Education, only gave a general answer that universities follow the admission regulations, after the exam results are available, they will have to publicly announce the conversion of equivalent benchmark scores, and the Ministry of Education and Training will supervise this publicity.

However, the Ministry of Education and Training's admission regulations only require schools to convert the equivalent benchmark scores of admission methods, not to convert the equivalent benchmark scores of combinations. At the same time, the Ministry of Education and Training's admission guidelines require schools not to divide admission quotas by combination, the software will choose the combination that is most beneficial for TS.

Talking to Thanh Nien reporters, many university admission officers in Hanoi said that most schools will choose the easiest way, which is to consider equalization between combinations without raising the issue of choosing the original combination. The equivalent conversion of standard scores will only be done with methods, not with combinations. If this method is widespread, it will be a risk of injustice for candidates taking the English test this year in university admission.

Some university leaders said that whether it is really unfair to students taking the English exam or not, we need to wait until the high school graduation exam results are available, with the score distribution of each subject and each exam combination. If the English score distribution is indeed lower than other elective subjects, the Ministry of Education and Training can still help schools create fairness by using the method of dividing the scores to convert the scores to the equivalent score distribution of the exam subjects. That is, ranking students based on the percentage of students achieving a specific score level, not ranking them by absolute score. "As far as I know, the Department of Quality Management, Ministry of Education and Training will propose the difference in scores between traditional combinations for universities to refer to," said the leader of a large university in Hanoi.

Ms. Pham Thanh Ha, Head of Training Department, Foreign Trade University, said in the admission information, although the school announced the "floor score" for admission as 24, it also added an open note: "The school's quality assurance threshold score can be adjusted based on the actual high school graduation exam score distribution in 2025".

Foreign Trade University will also wait for the exam results and then base on the score distribution of each combination to have the best admission solution for both the school and the candidates. "There will be a conversion solution to create fair admission opportunities for candidates in the A00, A01, D01 combinations," said Ms. Ha.

However, Dr. Le Anh Duc, Head of the Training Department, National Economics University, said that the school had announced that when the candidate registered for the exam, the admission would be regardless of the combination. Now, it cannot be changed because the exam questions of one subject are more difficult than another. "Fairness is to comply with the rules of the game that have been announced in advance," said Mr. Duc.

Associate Professor Nguyen Dao Tung, Director of the Academy of Finance, also said that the school had informed the candidates that the admission score was based on a 30-point scale and there was no difference between the groups. Therefore, the school could not change this regulation.

Source: https://thanhnien.vn/tuyen-sinh-dh-2025-nguy-co-bat-cong-tu-de-thi-tieng-anh-kho-185250630221003342.htm