Challenges to the sustainable development of CLCs in Vietnam

Lê Thị Thanh Thu HCMC Open University

CLCs are continuing education institutions in the Vietnam education system. They are the learning center at the village level, which are self-managed by community, with the government management and support as well as the participation and contribution of people in community (Decision 10/VBHN-BGDĐT, dated 14/3/2014).

The main aim of CLCs is to organize integrated activities to provide LLL opportunities to people in community for improvement of quality of life and community development (Zolfaghari, Sabran & Zolfaghari, 2009; Pham, 2010).

CLCs

CLC staff- Director: a village administrative manager, working part time - 2 Vice-Directors: a manager from the Association for Study Promotion and one manager from the local primary or lower secondary school, all working part time. - One teacher and presenters.

CLCs

Management- Goverment authorities and MOET authorities co-govern CLCs. - The village People Commitee manages directly its CLC (fund, governance, human resources, content and activity planning) and the district Bureau of Eucation & Training provides professional guidelines (content of activities, sending teachers, training, supervision and evaluation) Budget- From government according to the Circular 96/2008/TT-BTC.- From local welfare programs, donors and tuition fee.

CLCs

The number of CLCs has grown quickly accounting for 97,3% the villages nation-wide with rich teaching

content and methods of delivery become more diverse. The positive impacts of CLCs are widely

recognized in public as follows:

1- CLCs, a crucial mechanism to cater the learning society at the grassroots level, plays an important role in promoting the learning society in Vietnam (Luong, 2007; Building a learning society 2012 – 2020 project; Ngoc Anh, 2014).

CLC achievements

+ CLCs contribute substantially to literacy/ post literacy popularization and adult literacy (Brouwer, 2006; Pham, 2010; Zolfaghari, Sabran & Zolfaghari, 2009).

+ CLCs provide vocational training and helps raise the number of skilled workers in society.+ CLCs provide knowledge, productivity raising techniques, life skills, and income generation skills to people in community, which do help eliminate the poverty of the people, esp. those in difficulty areas (Le, 2009).

CLC achievements

2- CLCs help impart the policies of the Party and Government new regulations to raise the awareness of people about legislation and laws, to keep the society stable, and to raise the law abiding awareness of people.3- CLCs raise the awareness of people in the community about the environment protection, community health care, and in steps set up the cultural way of life leading to the culture and learning promoted communes (Phạm, 2010).

CLC achievements

CLCs develop quickly in numbers but most of them function ineffectively

(Building a learning society 2012 – 2020 project)

Only 30% of them are considered effective

- Thua Thien-Hue roughly has 75/152 effective CLCs (Hoang, 2013); Tay Ninh has 24/95 effective CLCs (Duy Hien, 2014); Ba Ria-Vung Tau has 34/82 rather effective CLCs (AnhTuấn, 2012) and Binh Thuan province has 34/127 effective CLCs (Thu Ha, 2014).

Challenges to the sustainable developmentof CLCs

1- CLC staff- The appointed CLC managers work part time and they are unstable as they leave CLCs after their administrative terms. They are not quite committed to CLCs as they have to undertake their main duty. - Some CLC managers are not fully aware of the characteristics of CLCs to operate them properly. The tendency to consider CLCs as a government entity, to rely on the government support or to wait for the guidance from the authorities is quite popular (Okukawa, 2009; Thống Nhất, 2011).

Challenges to CLCsustainable development

- CLC managers’ competence and qualifications could not meet the new demands in CLC management. They lack experience in organizing CLC activities (Document 2264/BGDĐT-GDTX, dated 6/5/2014),

and knowledge in educational management. It is one of the most challenging issues at present (Trần, 2014).

- Teachers and presenters lack teaching methodology for adult learners and some do not meet the learning demands at the locality.

Challenges

2- Teaching materials are not prolific and their content is inadequate to the local demands- CLC programs are not varied. The content and activities are not designed flexibly with open up or topped on content. - Some program contents are not appropriate and responsive to the local demands (Báo Mới, 2014).

- Topics related to special working skills for different groups of people in the community are not paid proper attention.

Challenges

3- CLC activities lack community participation- CLC activities are dully simple in contents and operations which hardly attract people in community (Nguyễn & Đỗ, 2012)

- Community participation and commitment to CLC activities are limited (Okukawa, 2009).

- CLC activities are designed without community needs assessment and do not involve people in community for operations (Tran, 2014)

Challenges

4- Low budget and weak infra structure - CLCs face difficulties in maintaining their frequent activities (Chau, 2007). Society and learners contribute only small share (Carlsen, 2010).

- CLCs do not raise fund effectively for their activities. CLC managers are not capable of mobilizing social resources for their self-sustaining. (Bao moi, 2014). - CLCs do not fully use the local infra structure for their activities.

Challenges

5- Unclear of what to do in combining CLC with the center of culture and sports - Some villages do not conduct successfully the combination of CLC with the center of culture and sports into the center of culture and community learning (Như Anh, 2013).

- Villages are confused in operating the new model of CLCs as the new model staff need a member from the culture section and guidelines for the government funding (Hoàng, 2013).

Challenges

In the period 2012-2020, CLCs- Need to be strenghthened; to develop sustainably and to enhance the quality of their activities; - Need to expand to the hamlets, or groups in communes; - Need to diversify the education contents and programs.

* Striving to raise the number of CLCs having effective operations.* Developing the model of combining CLCs with the center of culture and sports which operate effectively.

(Building a learning society 2012 – 2020 project)

Directions to develop CLCs

1- Undertaking sufficiently all MOET solutionsMOET proposed the focus of the school year 2014-

2015: Consolidating CLC activities, as follows: - Consolidating CLC activities in accordance to the motto “learning what is required” from the community.- Developing the piloting model of combining the CLC with the village center of culture and sports to maximize the local infrastructure and capacities.

Recommendations to develop CLCs sustainably

- Strengthening CLC managers, and the presenters. - District Bureau of Education and Training in connection with CEC providing the training to CLC managers and presenters at least twice a year.

- Organizing the writing of CLC materials to update knowledge, skills and technology transfer. The materials must address directly to community problems and issues.

Recommendations

- Making full use of Circular 96/2008/TT-BTC dated 27/10/2008 of the Ministry of Finance.

- Organizing the CLC evaluation with the guidance from Document 2553/ BGDĐT-GDTX, dated 18/4/2013 of MOET.

- Establishing new CLCs where there is nil targeting that in 2015 all villages have CLCs. (Document 4221/BGDĐT-GDTX, dated 8/8/2014)

Recommendations

2- Other solutions

- The CLC establishment to meet the planning target should be reconsidered. CLCs are not the administrative entity, they are established by the community, managed by the community and serve the community. If there is no need from the community then it is unnecessary to set it up.

Recommendations

- It is necessary to study and evaluate the new model of CLCs in Vietnam: The model of combination of CLCs with the center of culture and sports: These multi purpose centers have to provide education and training and cultural and sports activities. They have characteristics of a self managed center at the village level and those of an administrative organization in localities to modify and develop the new model gradually in Vietnam.

Recommendations

- CLCs should be suspended or closed when CLCs’ activities hardly meet the community learning demand and could not attract the community participation.

- The commune level authorities should be reminded to strongly support their CLCs as CLCs are their means and solutions to develop the local economy, and to raise the living standards of their own people.

Recommendations

- CLC activities should be constructed flexibly, diversely, and responsively to the characteristics of specific communities, their level of development and their socio-economic conditions, to meet the fast changing learning demand of Vietnam society. Some programs were useful before might turn out to be unnecessary currently and in the future.

Recommendations

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