On the morning of December 6, the Ministry of Education and Training held a workshop to exchange, share and honor advanced models in the work of literacy eradication for ethnic minority people.
In his opening speech, Mr. Nguyen Xuan Thuy, Deputy Director of the Department of Vocational Education - Continuing Education, Ministry of Education and Training, said that although the literacy rate of the 15-35 age group has reached 99.39% and the 15-60 age group has reached 99.10%, illiteracy and re-blindness still occur in many ethnic minority communities where socio-economic conditions are still difficult.
He emphasized that illiteracy is the foundation for improving people's knowledge, and is the first condition for every citizen to access development opportunities in the digital age.
Sharing at the ceremony, Colonel Ca Van Lap - Deputy Chief of Political Affairs of the Border Guard, said that to eliminate illiteracy and children of school age who drop out of school, Border Guard units have actively and proactively coordinated with localities and schools to each household to encourage their children to go to school, send staff in charge, and teachers to take turns teaching.
After many years of implementing illiteracy eradication, over 70,000 people have been literacy eradicated, more than 80,000 children have been disseminated primary education, nearly 50,000 students who have dropped out of school have been mobilized to return to school, especially over 40 villages and "white" villages have been eradicated for education, including contributions from Border Guard officers and soldiers and teachers on duty on border and sea and island routes.
Lieutenant Colonel Nguyen Nhu Hong, Deputy Political Commissar of the National Defense Economic Group 4, Nghe An province, shared that the difficulty in opening a literacy education class is changing the viewpoint and backward customs of the locality.
"To eliminate the backward view, the entire political system must get involved" - Major Nguyen Nhu Hong said.
With practical experience, the unit has had creative ways of promoting illiteracy in conjunction with supporting people.
"In our political tasks, we have proposed to include poverty reduction support projects, seedlings, etc. to support people. The officials went directly to the villages to survey by making forms and signing them. For each household that cannot sign, make a list, determine how many in the village are unliterate. We move in many ways.
We discussed with the people, having to go to school to erase illiteracy, not going to school without giving birth. Saying that is fun, but this is a method of mobilization, associated with serving the lives of the people" - he said.
Major Lo Van Thoai (Nam Lanh Border Guard Station, Son La) was concerned that many classes were opened right in the border station, combining teaching with legal propaganda, marriage prevention, human trafficking and technical production instructions.
"To let people go to class, we might have to help them harvest rice before starting the class" - Mr. Thoai shared.
As a person directly involved in literacy work in the locality, Ms. Lieu Thi Phuong - Principal of Ba Son Primary School, Lang Son shared that people in villages often have a afraid and shy mentality when talking about literacy learning. Therefore, the school must coordinate with village elders, village chiefs, prestigious people in the village, village party cell secretaries, and mobilize students.
In 2025, the school will open an illiteracy class with a scale of 40 students. After only 2 weeks of opening, the number of students increased to 88, and was divided into 3 classes.
"The school has mobilized the Army, Youth Union, women, ... to teach illiteracy. The advantage is that classes can be held at schools because the population is concentrated around the school.
The biggest difficulty in the teaching process is that 100% of ethnic minorities have difficulty speaking, the ability to absorb information, and very poor listening skills. Therefore, teaching Vietnamese spelling is very difficult" - Ms. Phuong shared.
For the students, Ms. Phuong said that people enjoy the policies of the National Target Program on littering. But for teachers, Ms. Phuong expressed that teachers still face many difficulties. Teachers teach 2 sessions/day, and at night they teach illiteracy, so the preparation of the lectures must be parallel to teaching the primary program.
"The school is far from the center, there are teachers who have to go back more than 100km because their families and children are still young and cannot stay at school. I hope to have a preferential treatment policy for teachers who directly teach illiteracy" - Ms. Phuong expressed.
