10 Minimum requirements for delivery of distance education program at higher education level in Vietnam as of February 12, 2024

10 Minimum requirements for delivery of distance education program at higher education level in Vietnam as of February 12, 2024 (Internet image) 

Regarding this issue, LawNet answers as follows:

On December 28, 2023, the Minister of Education and Training issued Circular 28/2023/TT-BGDDT on the Regulation on distance education at higher education level.

10 Minimum requirements for delivery of distance education program at higher education level in Vietnam as of February 12, 2024

To deliver distance education program at higher education level in Vietnam as of February 12, 2024, training institutions must meet the following minimum requirements:

(1) Distance education systems of training institutions have been completely constructed with all components mentioned in clause 5 Article 2 of the Regulation issued together with Circular 28/2023/TT-BGDDT (hereinafter referred to as the Regulations).

(2) Training institutions deliver distance education programs for academic disciplines that have been approved for opening and have enrolled at least 3 consecutive courses of full-time learners. Do not delivery distance education for health sectors with practice certificates and teacher training majors.

(3) The distance education program has been developed, evaluated, and issued according to regulations on training program standards; develop, evaluate, and promulgate training programs for higher education levels of the Ministry of Education and Training; training program standards issued by the Ministry of Education and Training and the provisions of the Regulations.

(4) The distance education department must manage and supervise the following: the teaching and learning process; the amount of time allotted for interaction between lecturers and learners, between learners and learners; exams, tests, assessments and awarding of degrees.  The specialized leading unit in the distance education program is also the specialized leading unit in the full-time program.

(5) The system of examination and academic performance assessment must ensure objectivity and honesty; evaluate the learning process, evaluate the end of the module and subject; control and authenticate learners' learning progress through their studies, test scores, exam results, and performance on assigned tasks in their programs.

(6) The training institution’s regulations must comply with the Regulations and other relevant laws.

(7) The team of lecturers, learning support staff, and school administrators are sufficient in terms of quantity, quality, qualifications and structure; have been trained in skills, teaching methods, and distance education management.

- Full-time lecturers must comply with regulations on training program standards and relevant training program standards issued by the Ministry of Education and Training. Full-time lecturers with doctoral degrees who are responsible for presiding over the development and implementation of training programs and presiding over teaching the program according to regulations on opening academic disciplines and training program standards of the Ministry of Education and Training are required to directly teach the distance education program;

- Up to 30% of the academic load of distance education program is delivered by visiting lecturers; and is increased to up to 50% when and only when the visiting lecturer is a full-time lecturer of the joint training partner as prescribed in Article 7 of the Regulations and delivers at least 20% of the academic load of distance education program

(8) Facilities, equipment, libraries, and study materials must be adequately provided in order to deliver distance education, in specific:

- Having technical rooms spacious enough to install distance education equipment and staff rooms with enough space and providing necessary amenities for administrators, learning support staff, and lecturers;

- Having adequate necessary equipment, infrastructure, and software to serve distance education modes; and sufficient systems for management of admission, training, and degree awarding along with the full-time training management system;

- Having the technical systems used for delivering distance education: Providing information related to the distance education;  storing and transmitting the contents of distance education programs to learners; supervising, managing, and assessing the learners through their learning process; storing and securing information on learning activities and student’s learning timeline and personal files in accordance with current legal regulations and training institution regulations on archives and information security; connecting information between learners, lecturers, and administrators through information technology systems;

- Having libraries or e-libraries providing the number of books, textbooks, reference materials and specialized digital adequate to assist learners in their learning and studying activities;

- Having enough core study materials and supplementary study materials for the first 2 years of the distance education program and have a plan to build and develop core study materials and supplementary study materials for the remaining units of study for the remaining years of the entire course so that the institution has adequate learning materials suitable for a specific distance education mode at least 1 year (12 months) before the start of the new school year.

(9) Meeting requirements on information technology application in online training for higher education of the Ministry of Education and Training.

(10) There is a distance education project developed for each specific training program, which describes in detail:  the need for opening distance education; full preparation of minimum requirements to deliver distance education, solutions and roadmap as prescribed in Article 5 of the Regulations; risk prevention and response plans to protect rights of learners, lecturers, the training institutions, and relevant parties.

The school council or university council decides on the distance education policy based on the proposal of the principal and the opinion of the scientific and training council of the training institution. The principal approves the project and decide on distance education based on appraisal opinions and assessment of the level of actual response against the minimum requirements for delivering distance education laid down by the scientific and training council of the training institution.

More details can be found in Circular 28/2023/TT-BGDDT taking effect on February 12, 2024.

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