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Although the new school year has begun nearly a month, universities have only announced provisional tuition fees for the first semester of the 2023-2024 school year.
Currently, while waiting for the Government to make a decision on university tuition fees this year, most schools are still collecting provisional tuition fees.
Associate Professor Nguyen Phong Dien, Vice President of Hanoi University of Science and Technology, said that according to this year's enrollment plan, the school plans to collect tuition fees for standard programs ranging from 23-29 million VND per year, an increase of about 8% compared to last year. Tuition fees for high-quality, international and international joint programs range from 25-90 million VND, similar to 2022. However, after the Government announced that it would amend Decree 81 on public tuition fees, the school decided to keep the first semester tuition fees the same as the past two years.
"From the second semester, if the Government stipulates that tuition fees will not increase, the school will still collect the same amount as the first semester. If allowed to increase, the school will only increase by a maximum of 8%."
Similarly, the provisional tuition fee for the first semester of Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology is 13.75-36 million VND, depending on the training program. This level is the same as last year, about 10% lower than expected. Previously, Ho Chi Minh City University of Transport also announced a halt to tuition increases. The school will collect about 10.6 million VND per year for the standard program, 5.9 million VND lower than expected. The new collection level is similar to the 2020-2021 school year, meaning the school will not increase tuition for four years.
Foreign Trade University and Diplomatic Academy also announced the provisional tuition fee for the first semester as last year.
Meanwhile, some other schools such as Thu Do University increased their tuition fees by 15 - 25% depending on the major compared to the previous school year. This increase has not reached the tuition ceiling stipulated in Decree 81 of the Government, which is a maximum increase of 30 - 53% depending on the major. The Ministry of Education and Training believes that if tuition fees for the 2023 - 2024 school year are implemented according to Decree 81, the ceiling will increase and become a huge burden on society. However, without adjustments to tuition fees, universities will face great difficulties in ensuring resources to improve the quality of education, training, and investment in facilities, etc.
Therefore, the proposal of the Ministry of Education and Training is to still increase tuition fees compared to the 2022-2023 school year but delay the increase by 1 year compared to the schedule, which means that the tuition fees for this school year will be collected at the same level as the tuition fees for the 2022-2023 school year instead of the tuition fees for the 2023-2024 school year as stipulated in Decree 81.
Many universities have expressed that not increasing tuition fees puts them under financial pressure, making it difficult to balance revenue and expenditure as well as implement strategic plans for training and development. So how can we have a sustainable financial mechanism for university education development?
Associate Professor, Dr. Do Van Dung - former Principal of Ho Chi Minh City University of Technical Education said that schools need to combine many synchronous solutions to increase revenue and reduce expenditure such as increasing digital transformation, saving electricity and water, investing effectively, reasonable income for lecturers and staff, increasing sponsorship from businesses...
Prof. Nguyen Dinh Duc, Chairman of the Council of the University of Technology (Hanoi National University) commented that according to Decree 81 and the new law, it is also necessary to build according to economic and technical standards, that is, to calculate correctly and sufficiently to ensure output quality, and we have also followed that roadmap.
If this year stops again, the school will continue to have no funding from regular expenditure sources for another year. Meanwhile, the tuition fee is not collected, so the difficulties are doubled. "In such a context, we hope that the Government as well as relevant ministries such as the Ministry of Finance and the Ministry of Education and Training will soon consider, change, and promptly adjust to create peace of mind and confidence for higher education institutions."
Dr. Le Viet Khuyen, Vice President of the Association of Vietnamese Universities and Colleges, said that currently, public schools are provided with a budget by the State to operate. However, last year, spending on university education accounted for only about 0.27% of GDP. This makes it difficult for schools to promote quality.
If the revenue from state support does not meet the training costs, universities will "call" to seek financial resources from other sources such as: calling for philanthropists, international investment projects, research activities and production labor...
The Vice President of the Association of Vietnamese Universities and Colleges said that investment from the state budget has been cut, other sources of income are also insignificant, forcing schools to increase tuition fees to ensure quality and stable training strategies.
Increasing tuition fees invisibly creates inequality in society. "The issue that universities must pay special attention to is the need to optimize costs. When costs are calculated, used most effectively, and unnecessary parts are cut, revenue will be more abundant."
On the side of the Ministry of Education and Training, recognizing the difficulties that universities are facing with the decision not to increase tuition fees this school year, Deputy Minister of Education and Training Hoang Minh Son pointed out that for university education, revenue from tuition fees accounts for about 50-90%. In the context of rising prices, resources for university education institutions have not increased in the past 3 years, this is a big challenge to retain lecturers and teachers. "To support schools, the Ministry of Education and Training strives to ensure regular spending on university education, and has not yet implemented a roadmap to calculate the price of university education services.
The Ministry of Education and Training will also propose that the Government have a policy to support schools in the difficult context of not increasing tuition fees for 3 consecutive years, similar to supporting businesses.
According to Health and Life