On the afternoon of June 12, after the exams for elective subjects, the Ministry of Education and Training held a press conference to conclude the 2026 high school graduation exam.
At the press conference, the content of concern was the fairness and openness of this year's high school graduation exam in Literature.
The writing part in the 2026 high school graduation Literature exam presents materials from famous technology figures such as Steve Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk with the requirement to answer the question "How to have Vietnamese Steve Jobs?".
Regarding this content, there are concerns about the fairness of the exam questions between regions, when referring to technology figures in the world.
Clarifying this issue, Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Ha - Deputy Director of the Department of Quality Management, Ministry of Education and Training - affirmed that the requirement to ensure the highest level of fairness for candidates in all regions has been set in the process of building exam questions for all subjects.
Mr. Ha said that this content has been discussed and discussed very carefully in the process of building the exam questions.
This is a question placed in the candidate differentiation section" - Mr. Ha said.
Mr. Nguyen Ngoc Ha informed that compared to last year, the social commentary part has changed from 4 points to 2 points and is identified as a new part with differentiating effects.
Representatives of the Ministry of Education and Training said that the social commentary part aims to assess students' understanding and reasoning abilities. However, the question order in the exam is built very clearly and fully, creating conditions for students to combine their own understanding with the information provided in the materials to do the test.
Reading the materials carefully, you will see that the exam questions do not require students to mechanically memorize information about biography, inventions or similar contents. There is no such requirement in the exam questions" - Mr. Ha emphasized.
Mr. Ha added that the phrase "Steve Jobs Vietnam" is placed in quotation marks as a form of metaphor and is the content that students need to identify and analyze. When reading the question, students see mentioning three famous figures. These are all technology symbols and in the use of words there are also certain technical intentions.
Mr. Ha said that each question, each word in the exam questions is carefully selected, consulted with professional opinions, looked up dictionaries and considered how to express content related to innovation. The entire process is carried out thoroughly before the exam questions are completed.
Thus, regional factors have been taken into account in the exam question development process. This is a classification question" - a representative of the Ministry of Education and Training affirmed.
Mr. Ha noted that Literature has specific characteristics different from many other subjects. Literature is both scientific and artistic. However, the openness of Literature needs to be understood correctly.
For many years, the assessment mainly revolved around a number of prescribed works, leading to the situation of learning sample essays and memorizing sample lessons becoming common. This is a major difference of this year's Literature exam.
The exam questions aim to assess students' thinking, feeling and reasoning abilities. Many messages are conveyed in the exam questions" - Mr. Ha said.
