Preschool teachers work 10-12 hours a day
On April 8, the Vietnam Institute of Educational Sciences (VNIES) in coordination with the Department of Preschool Education, the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), the World Bank and the Australian Embassy organized the workshop "Towards the goal of improving the quality of preschool education".
Prof. Dr. Le Anh Vinh - Director of the Vietnam Institute of Educational Sciences - said that in the past time, the Party and the State have always paid special attention through policies on preschool education.
However, he acknowledged that preschool education still faces many challenges. In some localities, especially industrial parks and export processing zones, parents have to work long shifts, making it difficult to pick up and drop off children. In addition, the team of preschool teachers - those who are directly caring for children - are under great work pressure.
Many surveys show that the working hours of preschool teachers can be up to 10-12 hours per day - this is an extremely great sacrifice," he said.
Therefore, Prof. Dr. Le Anh Vinh believes that it is necessary to design a flexible working regime suitable for preschool teachers nationwide. In addition, there need to be more flexible plans such as taking care of children outside of school hours, picking up early and dropping off late, and calculating appropriate support funds.
This is a big problem that requires strong involvement and understanding from the People's Committees of provinces and cities" - Mr. Vinh acknowledged.
Emphasizing the view that preschool education is not just a story of the education sector alone, but a common responsibility of the whole society, Mr. Vinh said that there needs to be close coordination between families, schools and society.
If this is done well, the problem of education quality will be solved sustainably" - he emphasized.
Proposal to increase salaries for preschool teachers, extend maternity leave to 12 months
Presenting a presentation at the workshop, Ms. Helle Buchhave - Head of the Global Gender Group, World Bank - said that Vietnam currently has about 4.8 million female workers in the manufacturing sector in industrial parks, equivalent to 19% of female workers. This is a group directly affected by the shortage of childcare services.
The reasons why families cannot access childcare services come from: Payability; Concerns about quality and safety; Lack of space for children under 3 years old; Inappropriate operating hours; Household registration barriers; Subsidies have not reached the most needed group.
Data shows that up to 75% of mothers who currently do not use registered childcare services said they would switch if there was a place. For children aged 3-12 months, 83.6% of needs are not met. In An Giang province, communes with industrial parks do not have facilities for children under 3 years old.
Meanwhile, the public system is still limited, only 23% of facilities receive children under 2 years old. In the non-public sector, many facilities face difficulties in terms of standard human resources, financial resources and access to support policies.
To solve the "bottleneck" in the childcare system, especially in urban areas and industrial parks, World Bank experts have proposed 3 major groups of solutions, including content on improving the regime for preschool teachers.
Specifically, the current support level is still low, causing teachers' incomes, especially in the non-public sector, to be limited. Therefore, it is necessary to issue a national-level salary policy for education and childcare staff applicable to both the public and non-public sectors. Salary scale approaching the living standard salary; salary increases according to a roadmap associated with professional qualifications and strategic goals.
Notably, World Bank experts also proposed extending maternity leave to 12 months. The proposed plan is that each parent takes 6 months off, in order to share the responsibility of taking care of young children.
Along with that, experts recommend a number of short-term actions to be implemented such as: Increasing the number of places for children under 3 years old in public preschools, relaxing the payroll ceiling, extending school hours, removing administrative barriers to migrants, synchronizing childcare policies with parental leave policies and flexible work...
