These tasks should not be the responsibility of the ministry, according to Asso Prof and Dr Dao Cong Tien, the UEH's former rector, who spoke at a recent workshop on education reform held at University of Economics HCM City (UEH).

Only by having more autonomy could universities make better decisions, according to Tien.

The ministry should also not dictate the enrolment quota for each university, he said, adding that it should be based on the number of facilities and lecturers.

Tien said that the ministry should hand over recruitment to each university as soon as possible.

He said it was important that the ministry did not prolong the handover because it was necessary to ensure the quality of the incoming students.

Also, the university should choose students based on their learning results in high school instead of their scores on university entrance exams, he added.

However, the deputy minister of Education and Training, Bui Van Ga, said that administrative and enrollment autonomy could not be given to all universities throughout the country.

It was necessary to maintain some control in order to ensure the quality of training at the tertiary level, he added.

The ministry has control over only several main universities, including HCM City and Hanoi National universities and the UEH.

Universities that have been established for a few years have not had enough capacity for administrative autonomy.

The ministry has allowed some main universities to recruit students independently for the next school year, according to Ga.

The ministry has also asked these universities to submit their recruitment plans, but it has yet to receive any plans from them.

At the workshop, Dr Vo Thanh Thu of the UEH suggested that the ministry should go to other countries to view training models and copy them if they were appropriate to Vietnam.This would help to shorten the time of education reform, Thu said.

Ga said the ministry had made field trips to other countries to study quality training models, but has not found an appropriate model for Vietnam.
Other education experts have asked the ministry to end operations of universities that fail to ensure training quality.

Ga said the ministry would expand quality assessment at universities, and impose stiff fines and stop operations if they were found not ensure quality.