A round back to the podium
In the days of August, when schools in the highland commune of Ngoc Chien are busy preparing for the new school year, Mr. Tran Van Quyen started a seemingly familiar job that has been gone for more than two decades, which is compiling lesson plans to return to teaching.
In a letter sent in early August, Mr. Quyen requested to be dismissed from the position of Principal of Ngoc Chien Secondary School according to his personal wishes. He shared: "Previously, I was appointed as principal from a teacher. Now, I have returned from being a principal to being a teacher, in accordance with my initial job.
Recalling the distant days, Mr. Quyen said that in November 2000, he started working at Chieng Hoa Primary School, a commune in the lake area of Muong La district.
Less than 3 years later, in August 2003, he was appointed Principal of Chieng Cong Primary School. At that time, a principal was in charge of all three levels of education, from preschool, primary to secondary school.
After the school was separated into three separate units, he continued to take on management work at the secondary school level.
As of 2026, Mr. Quyen has 26 years in the Education sector, including about 23 years as principal. Most of that journey is associated with difficult areas of the Muong La highlands.
In his resignation letter, he wrote that the position of principal has a large workload, requiring him to regularly focus time, effort and responsibility on leading, managing, and operating the school.
When family circumstances change, balancing those two responsibilities becomes increasingly difficult.
Therefore, he chose to return to chalk, blackboard and the math problems that once brought him into the profession.
Lesson plans by the oil lamp
In Mr. Quyen's memory, the early years in Chieng Cong were the most difficult but unforgettable period.
From the center of Muong La district to the commune is about 45 km. In the years 2003-2005, there was no electricity here, and phone signals also did not cover it. Teachers lived in the middle of the mountain, taking care of each meal with wood stoves.
At night, flickering oil lamp lights become a source of light for them to prepare and grade for students.
No electricity, no means of communication, the lives of the teachers at that time were almost isolated from the outside.
“We cook rice on wood stoves, and in the evening we prepare lesson plans under the oil lamp. There were many difficulties, but it was those years that made the teachers live with each other very affectionately and closely” - Mr. Quyen recalled.
Mr. Quyen recounted that in the afternoons when work is over, teachers come out to sit on a stone slab, looking down at the valley to relieve the feeling of sadness and homesickness.
But then the next morning, teachers still clung to the school, clung to the village amidst hundreds of hardships.
With the desire to leave the management position, he also wants to create opportunities for young, capable and more suitable cadres to continue to take on the management and administration of the school.
Mr. Lo Van Thoa - Vice Chairman of Ngoc Chien Commune People's Committee - said that the locality acknowledges Mr. Quyen's personal wishes and proactive spirit.
According to commune leaders, Mr. Quyen is a professional official with many years of management experience in difficult areas.
His voluntary request to return to work as a teacher creates more favorable conditions for the process of arranging and consolidating the school management staff.
According to Mr. Thoa, whether in a management position or directly teaching, Mr. Quyen's accumulated experience after more than two decades is still a necessary resource for local education.
Ngoc Chien commune currently has 3 schools, including a kindergarten, a primary school and a secondary school, with a total of 97 classes. In which, preschool has 28 classes, primary school has 47 classes and secondary school has 22 classes.
The management team has 9 people, including 3 principals and 6 vice principals.
