COVID-19 and higher education in Vietnam: Systematically rethinking the quality assurance system and practices towards the ‘new normal’ in post-crisis era

Internal quality assurance

The section below attempts to highlight the challenges posed by the pandemic to the IQA of Vietnamese HEIs following the conceptualization of quality (Harvey and Green, 1993; Mishra, 2006) that embodies three dimensions of teaching and learning, inputs and outputs. Existing obstacles and complications that emanated from the pandemic will be simultaneously analysed according to each dimension outlined in the framework.

Teaching and learning

The repercussions of the COVID-19 crisis on the quality of teaching and learning in Vietnamese HE is most explicitly manifested in the areas of curriculum, content delivery and assessment.

Firstly, in terms of curriculum, it has been emphasized that in the challenging context of COVID-19, curriculum serves not purely as “a conveyor or product of a particular body of knowledge’”but also needs to be flexibly reinforced to accommodate an active course of substantive learning inquiry (Nan-Zhao, 2005: n.p). Whilst curriculum represents one key measure of educational quality and students’ learning outcomes that has been standing at the heart of national efforts in enhancing the quality of HE worldwide (UNESCO, 2004), the suspension of physical, in-person classes has induced Vietnamese HEIs to rethink their delivery approaches. Under Directive No. 795/BGDĐT-GDĐH issued in 2020, detailed guidelines for universities, academies and colleges were set out by MoET to encourage and instruct HEIs to actively embrace distance teaching and learning. However, ‘difficult’ and ‘challenges’ are the most frequently repeated phrases in the latest quick report from MoET on the implementation of online teaching and learning after the 2021 new school year commenced (Duong, 2021). Since this was the first-time online and blended learning was officially recognized and widely applied in Vietnam, these policy mandates were relatively generic, top-down structured rather than institutionally quality-focused. This swift transition which embraces the incorporation of a new fully online mode into university curricula raises concerns over the sustainability of quality itself in the long run. For some Vietnamese HEIs that have been intensively internationalizing their curriculum following the Higher Education Reform Agenda, the digitization of curriculum in the time of crisis presents implications for reshaping the competencies of the educators to adapt to new quality standards (Nguyen et al., 2019). These challenges and expected changes in educational practices in Vietnam echo the findings in studies carried out by Cunningham and Pardo (2019), Jones and Sharma (2020), and Famularsih (2020).

Secondly, regarding content delivery, an exemplary issue is programmes that involve practicum. According to Pham and Ho (2020), the unplanned shift to online practicum in many institutions and disciplines undesirably turned many universities into submissive e-learning laboratories without properly updating their learning objectives, syllabuses, and content outlines. Furthermore, many HEIs have struggled during the crisis to maintain their quality and satisfy students’ needs due to a scarcity of e-learning materials (Dinh and Nguyen, 2020; Ho et al., 2020). In some specialised majors such as medical studies, although the theoretical components can be delivered online, it is not always possible to compensate for the practical and clinical training that students miss during lockdowns. Indeed, such a deficiency of interactions with peers and field work opportunities likely hinder students from developing cooperative and individualistic learning skills as well as attaining cognitive instructional objectives (Bloom, 1956).

In terms of assessment, Document 707/BGDĐT-GDDH by MoET in 2021 provides guidelines for evaluating graduation projects and theses delivered online during the pandemic, and many universities have commenced to adopt various forms of online assessment. Accordingly, HEIs grant autonomy of organizing examinations to faculties and departments, who mostly rely on the learning outputs or standards of a particular module/discipline to decide the most appropriate methods of assessment. Assessment tools vary from online oral quizzes, and multiple choice exams to essay exams, and assignments (See Ministry of Education and Training, 2020a, Ministry of Education and Training, 2020b). However, many universities encountered critical hurdles during implementation; the most identifiable issues were administering test questions, organizing exams, ensuring reliability of academic results and addressing equality in accessing fair and transparent assessment (Pham, 2021; Tran et al., 2020). Findings from an online survey conducted across 225 undergraduate students at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology and Education demonstrated that insufficient interactions and constraints in infrastructure are compelling drawbacks leading to inaccurate reflection of their actual performance in partaking of e-assessment during the pandemic (Lu and Nguyen, 2020). This calls for an evolution in evaluation practices that requires more holistic and flexible e-learning criteria for the purpose of quality assessment to ensure credibility of learning outcomes in a virtual world (Eaton, 2020). Implications of the process may include the construction of national academic test banks and complete online testing systems as well as innovation in strengthening quality culture across involved stakeholders.

Inputs

Regarding inputs for quality provision of HE, Vietnam has been confronted with underdeveloped resources, both physically and virtually in the areas of infrastructure, human resources and finance (Pham and Ho, 2020). These obstacles have been intensified under the enormous impacts of COVID-19 and critically challenged educational quality.

The adoption of hybrid or online education during the COVID-19 pandemic obligates a process that is composed of collective efforts and procedures. These vary from developing a robust internal QA system for e-learning to incorporating perspectives from all stakeholders including students, academics, support staff, alumni, and employers. Empirical evidence from the case of Vietnamese social work educators and students (e.g. Dinh and Nguyen, 2020; Pham et al., 2021) demonstrates that restricted access to technology resources (e.g. disrupted Internet connection and low-quality sound of the lectures) has impeded effective participation in online courses during COVID-19. These studies indicated that the level of satisfaction of students and lecturers of educational quality was significantly lower than pre-COVID face-to-face instruction delivery. It is noteworthy that in some distant, isolated areas such as Dien Bien, Quang Nam, 70% of students do not have access to electronic devices, not to mention stable internet connection (Duong, 2021). The transformation to e-learning enacted by social-distancing mandates further widens the existing gap in resource accessibility between rural and urban regions, which almost seemed invisible prior to the pandemic thanks to the availability of physical classes (Ewing, 2021; Tran et al., 2020).

Furthermore, a critical shortage in well-trained, qualified QA human capital as well as appropriate staff capacity building schemes has been identified as one of the long-term impediments to the development of the internal QA mechanism within HEIs (Nguyen, 2019; Pham, 2018). For active Vietnamese QA specialists working at QA Units of universities, their challenges comprise a deficiency of knowledge, skills, experience and low English command. This situation is ascribed to the existent Vietnamese HE context, which leaves little or no room for a sufficient, ongoing scheme of professional development for QA staff (either formally through intensive QA-focused education or informally through professional workshops and training), their irrelevant profiles prior to undertaking QA roles, as well as the growing involvement of inexperienced young professionals, who possess inadequate comprehension of HE operations. Meanwhile, the limited English competencies also hamper these personnel from profoundly engaging with the international QA community, reflecting on enhanced models of QA and accreditation globally, and strengthening their professional practices (Nguyen, 2021).

In times of instability and disruption, the lack of competence and experience in implementing online QA practices may jeopardize the effectiveness of QA policy/guideline implementation. Their participation as professional interlocutor for national control and institutional governance will potentially bring pertinent implications for the post-pandemic realities that require Vietnamese HEIs to critically ‘re-evaluate, rethink, and retool approaches to instructional practices’ (Felix, 2021: 1) to maintain and enhance educational quality in preparation to stay more resilient to future crises.

As to financial resources, despite repeated calls for fostering institutional autonomy in governmental documents over the years (Higher Education Law, 2012; Revised Higher Education Law, 2018; Fundamental and Comprehensive Education Reform, 2013), moderate progress has been recorded in HEIs in Vietnam. This is partially attributed to an absence of a homogeneous scheme for institutional financial management. In Vietnam, annual funds allocated to public HEIs are managed by the Ministry of Finance and not until reimbursement is made to them will an annual budget for QA activities be finalized and assigned by institutions themselves. As an indirect receiver of funding, many HEIs position themselves as being stranded in a half-way institutional autonomy, submissive and ‘exercise a little independence in the management of their own matters’ (Le et al., 2019: 7). During a time of crisis, inflexibility in finance management can impede many Vietnamese HEIs from settling budgets in response to urgent quality-improvement demands and high-cost services.

Outputs

In terms of output, staff performance, learning outcomes and employability are key quality outputs that have been substantially suppressed by the pandemic’s turbulence.

One concern that emerged from the COVID-19 era for many HEIs is staff performance and professional development. For academics, the hasty transition from traditional ‘talk-and-chalk’ classrooms to virtual teaching without foundational IT-training or professional development activities has been reported as a frustrating experience. According to a large-scale survey conducted on the COVID-19 impacts in HEIs across 47 countries/territories including Vietnam, individual psychological and behavioural responses have been confirmed to be negatively influenced (Asian Pacific Quality Network, 2020). However, issues of mental health support have long been overlooked in the Vietnamese education system. As we have studied through all the related QA documents in Vietnam, teachers' mental health and well-being has never been acknowledged as a quality index in any QA measurements. At the crisis juncture, little attention has been paid to how pedagogically stressful it has been for teachers due to the switch of the instructional mode of delivery.

Similarly, personal strains on lecturers resulting from the pandemic such as health concerns, emotional care, new family and domestic responsibilities, professional and personal plans, or household organisation are rarely put in the forefront, if at all considered. Studies have shown that Vietnamese teachers are undesirably pushed to stay more resilient to unexpected transformation in daily teaching routines caused by the pandemic (Pham and Phan, 2021; Pham et al., 2021). Indeed, despite the volume of work and additional training needed to adjust to online teaching and assessment during COVID-19, teacher remuneration paradoxically remains unchanged (Pham, 2021). That said, the pandemic has created a constant struggle of lecturers to balance between moral profession, cultural norms, teaching quality and the essentiality to financially sustain over a time of uncertainties. The extrinsic contextual and societal factors subsequently call for an ongoing ‘negotiation and reconstitution of values and identities’ (Phan and Phan, 2006: 136). It is hoped that this will indirectly mitigate adverse influences on the quality of academic outputs of teachers and learning outcomes of students throughout the pandemic compared to their pre-crisis teaching and learning.

Besides, education systems and employability skills are two key determinants that have the most severe effects on the unemployment rate in Vietnam under the COVID-19 impacts (Nguyen et al., 2019). Investigations into the employability of Vietnamese students majoring in English education during the pandemic revealed that the switch to remote learning mode has had ‘significant impact on their employability capital’ and imposed restrictions on their post-study career plans as well as their career-related decision-making, with variations recorded among groups of various backgrounds (Vu et al., 2022).

QA in a future where blended learning is the new trend

What looms in the post-pandemic future is a new paradigm of teaching and learning that might depart from traditional and lecture-based activities and skew towards more digitally facilitated group activities, discussions and individual self-exploration of online educational resources in Vietnam (Pham and Ho, 2020; Pham and Phan, 2021). In that sense, QA policies and practices need to follow and follow-up these possible changes. As learning now happens far beyond a four-walled room and may occur anytime, anywhere, both synchronously and asynchronously, evidence-based criteria for QA purposes might be more difficult to achieve and collect (Eaton, 2020). Learning, predicted by Ewing (2021: 39), will become more oriented to ‘stackable segments’ whereby participants can receive ‘education which is primarily just-in-time not just-in-case’. However, we should be mindful that digital learning requires stable infrastructure and digital platforms, which might be unevenly distributed across Vietnam. The disruptions to traditional classrooms created by the conversion to online learning has only occurred in provinces or cities where there was an outbreak. This requires flexibility in QA policies and practices, and the criteria of QA should be refined in order to satisfactorily address the situation of combined online and offline learning and teaching. Furthermore, learning may be disrupted for particular groups of marginalized students such as those of ethnic minorities in Vietnam living in disadvantaged conditions. The challenge for QA here is to embrace a holistic approach to online learning and teaching that not only guarantees effectiveness and transparency of the QA process, but also minimizes any inequalities caused by this incoming shift in instruction delivery. In this case, we expect there will be training for teachers in terms of content development, as well as assessment in online learning, or the combination of both online and offline learning when possible so that students in less advantaged areas will not be further disadvantaged by the ongoing crisis.

QA in a future where there is increasingly profound involvement of students in QA activities

It has been recommended that seeking collaborative opportunities between students and staff academic representatives is necessary so that students can be involved in the conception, design, implementation and review of any future programmatic and institutional changes (Whelehan, 2020). This partnership with students, hopefully, can contribute to a more student-led approach in the post-digital learning era. Concurring with Whelehan (2020), we foresee a future in which both students and teachers are on a similar learning journey in a digital learning environment. If this is to happen, QA policies and practices are expected to get involved in feedback mechanisms at an institutional level. In Vietnam, QA is seen as a ‘ritualistic activity’ carried out in HEIs to fulfil requirements set by GoV’s regulations (Tran and Vu, 2019: 115), sometimes the discourse only exists between universities’ leaders and their QA staff. The role of students in QA processes is restricted to surveys on teaching quality, programs, libraries and services offered at the institutions. The culture of student partnership or students-as-partners, a practice adopted by other developed QA systems such as those in the UK, Scotland and New Zealand, remains a completely new concept in the Vietnamese HE context (New Zealand Academic Quality Agency, 2017, Student Partnerships in Quality Scotland, 2012). The new situation of COVID-19 can be an opportunity for a collaborative approach to QA at the programme and institutional level that may play an important role in ensuring students successfully attain a quality education.

A future where QA is going hybrid

Whilst QA traditionally relies on actual classrooms, physical infrastructure and physical teacher-student interactions in HEIs to assess the educational settings, now QA policies and practitioners including QA policy makers at national and institutional levels and QA officers at QA units may need to take the virtual environment into consideration. From the institutional perspective, it is crucial to envision a future where both IQA and EQA operate on a hybrid basis. Specifically, HEIs may need to prepare for online visits of QA practitioners by better equipping themselves with technological support structures and tools, such as databases, document depositories and well-established online meeting platforms so that institutions and programs going through an online review are not disadvantaged. Hybrid forms of QA that combine both online and offline assessment are possible and desirable in the future.

It should be noted that online QA practices require rigorous examination of numbers, documents from experts, maintenance of confidentiality, professionality and non-conflict of interest, as well as acknowledgement of the specific challenges from the online environment (Kelo, 2020). We propose that online QA practices and/or hybrid QA practices are not only a ‘fire-fighting strategy’ to be used during the COVID-19 outbreak but can actually serve a longer-term purpose in Vietnamese HE for several reasons.

Firstly, online visits offer the possibility to engage experts of QA from abroad with less additional cost and to interact with more stakeholders, which Vietnam has needed for the implementation and improvement of its QA system. Going online can save travel time for practitioners and allow them to focus more on what matters most in the QA process, especially for EQA. Secondly, as expected and specified in the QA regulations of MoET, institutions will gradually bear the cost of QA by themselves. Hybrid QA practices can facilitate initial stages of EQA procedures such as initial accreditation, initial fact collection and fact checking. This will not only reduce the estimated cost of QA but also bring benefits such as timesaving, efficiency and wider participation of stakeholders (such as employers, policy makers, teachers, students and parents). Physical visits can be reserved for activities such as verification and feedback, which are critical for the improvement of QA in Vietnam due to great discrepancies among institutions of different geographical areas in the country.

The predicted rise of transnational higher education in Vietnam and challenges for QA

Global mobility has been stalled and international education, though still enticing for many students, may be negatively affected in the future (Yang, 2020). The hit of the novel virus has been detrimental to global economies and, henceforth, parents and students will need to take monetary expenditures into more serious consideration. Students may choose to stay in their home country rather than travel abroad for international education. Foreign students may also be denied study visas under the COVID-19 rules (as in the cases of border closures in Australia and New Zealand), and international travel may be more expensive and subject to more restrictions than before. The precarity and fear induced by the global outbreak of COVID-19 and the resultant restrictions on movement may lead students to opt for alternative to gain an international education experience other than physical mobility, such as transnational higher education (TNHE), or international education at home. This educational provision is offered through different variations of modalities such as joint-degree, twinning or articulation programs (e.g. 2+2, 3+1) and international branch campuses. In the former model, students pursue their degrees being co-delivered by a Vietnamese university and a foreign institution through which they spend the first phase (2 or 3 years) in Vietnam and the remainder overseas. The latter model requires the physical presence of a foreign institution in Vietnam that offers its programs offshore (e.g. RMIT University with their branch campuses based in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City). Other modes of TNHE (e.g. online courses) are excluded from the scope this paper covers. The nature of TNHE practices is complex and diverse (Knight and McNamara 2015) Hence, during the time of crisis, QA for TNHE programmes will draw more attention from policy makers and practitioners. This area of QA is still the least monitored in Vietnam (Nhan and Nguyen, 2018) and also the most challenging aspect because, as Ziguras and McBurnie (2014) specify, the nature of transnational partnerships in education entails difficulty in regulating and ensuring the quality of programs delivered whilst ensuring the quality of joint programs is one of the most important issues in implementing transnational education (Hou et al., 2016; Kallo and Semchenko, 2016). With the post-pandemic increasing interest in this form of education from students and parents, we expect the demand for QA practices of joint programmes and transnational higher education will also increase so that students can gain the actual benefits of international education.