Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son and USAID National Director in Vietnam Aler Grubbs signed a memorandum of understanding.
The Memorandum of Understanding is based on the more than 10-year cooperative relationship between USAID and Vietnam through programs to support the development of higher education. This memorandum of understanding will expand USAID's support for the Ministry of Education and Training to make Vietnam's higher education system increasingly innovative, creative and highly competitive.
We welcome the Vietnamese Government for its reforms to develop a globally competitive higher education system, said USAID Country Director Aler Grubbs at the signing ceremony. This is the first memorandum of understanding between USAID and the Ministry of Education and Training, demonstrating our continuous commitment to cooperating through a series of partnership programs on higher education to directly support the ambitious higher education reform goals of the Ministry of Education and Training.
Vietnam's 2018 amended and supplemented Law on Higher Education is promoting significant changes to move the country towards a more open higher education system. This Law has detailed regulations for public universities to have new authority related to teaching, recruitment, enrollment programs, as well as resource mobilization and management.
USAID supports efforts to innovate Vietnam's higher education system. Cooperating with US higher education institutions and the private sector, USAID is supporting Vietnamese universities to improve academic quality and strengthen governance of institutions to become models of modern higher education, while promoting the socio-economic development of Vietnam.
Many of these programs have connected Vietnamese universities with leading US higher education institutions and private enterprises to promote innovation in teaching and learning activities, quality assessment, curriculum innovation, research and university-enterprise linkage.
Through the signed memorandum of understanding, USAID will support the Ministry of Education and Training with a new project to provide direct technical assistance to review and improve policies on higher education. Improving policies will help promote university autonomy, ensure quality, digital transformation and innovation in areas that are key to Vietnam's continued economic growth and development.
