undergraduate

Distinguished Teacher and Hero of Labor Le Cong Co, DTU President and Provost, believes that eliminating permanent appointments for civil servants and teachers is beneficial to all.

No fear of abuse of power by management

The policy would create healthy motivation and competition among the teachers, who would need to improve their qualifications and skills, which would improve the quality of education at the same time.

“People say that switching to non-permanent contracts would give management too much power,” Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co surmised. “This would inevitably lead to abuse of power by those in charge. But I believe this is not to be feared. What we should focus on now is how to improve education.” At the same time he mentioned that all labor contracts are regulated by the Labor Law, and while management would still sign the new contracts, they would be legislated under the Collective Bargaining Agreement and protected by the Union, with the oversight of other authorities, such as departments of education and training, internal affairs, labor, war veterans and social affairs, in order to forestall any abuse of power.

New teaching laws are necessary

According to Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co, the traditional state regulated system has led to an understanding that, once appointed, teachers are secure and cannot be fired without causing problems in the workplace, resulting in little inertia. Equalization law means that skilled teachers are treated the same as mediocre ones and that competent teachers are not paid more than incompetent ones. This makes it impossible to motivate anyone.

If the Labor Law is changed, teachers would have to work in accordance with their new contracts according to the new regulations. The relationship between employees and employer would still be legal and make it much easier to deal with conflicts and establish healthier working relationships.

Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co added that, since education was socialized in 1994, there is an increasing number of private schools. The principals of those universities, colleges, secondary schools, primary schools and kindergartens have all chosen to hire teachers and lecturers through labor contracts and created a very efficient teaching corps. This is proof that, by doing away with permanent appointments, private schools can operate as well or sometimes even better than public ones.

Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co said: “However, I am of the opinion that the replacement of permanent contracts must be done correctly to eliminate all concerns, not regulated administratively but under the new Labor Law. I also propose that there should also be a law on teachers, to achieve this and establish a social consensus, especially among current teaching staff. However, if the policy to eliminate permanent positions is enacted, there will be complications. The difficulty is that the rights of those who have been previously appointed permanently must be addressed. I am confident that MOET will find a solution to this.”

(Media Center)