International schools the good choice, but…

A lot of parents now tend to bring their children to international schools instead of paying thousands of dollars worth of “underground fee” to obtain a seat at star state owned schools. However, international schools could not be the suitable choice for all.

High tuitions make parents shrink

In general, the total expenses for sending a child to a school which follows the international teaching model (with English intensive hours), including the meals and the boarder-day services are between four and 10 million dong a month. Meanwhile, the total expenses for international schools are around 20 million dong a month.

According to Saigon Tiep Thi, the tuition at some international schools is now 30 million dong per annum at the lowest, which does not include additional expenses. The A Chau (Asia) school system, for example, has the tuition levels from 31 million dong to 70 million dong. The figures are 99-184 million dong per annum for the Vietnam-Australia school, and 160-240 million dong for APU.

Besides, the HCM City international school which follows the IB high school curriculum, sets the tuition levels at 120-350 million dong per annum, while the international school which absolutely teaches in English 300-400 million dong per annum.

Truong Thi Thanh Trang in Phu Nhuan district, who has a daughter going to the Vietnam-Australia School, said that she and her husband had to think carefully before bringing the child to the international school.

“We should to calculate our total monthly income, and then choose the affordable schools. Especially, you should foresee that the tuitions will increase year after year. It would be terrible if your child have to leave for a state owned school just because of the tuition increases,” she said.

A series of international schools have raised the tuitions for the 2011-2012 academic year. A Chau system, for example, has raised the tuition from 3.7 million dong to 4.6 million dong per month, applied to secondary education, and from 3.1 million dong to 3.3 million dong, an increase of 20 percent over the previous year.

At the Vietnam-Australia private run international school, the tuition for every credit of the first grade (there are four credits a year) has increased from 15.7 million dong to 19.4 million dong. Meanwhile, the tuition for second graders has increased from 16.2 million dong to 20 million dong per credit.

Nguyen Thanh Ha, whose daughter is studying at the Vietnam-US international school in district 11 said that she received the notice on the tuition increase of nearly one million dong in May, and the new tuition has been applied since the summer semester.

“I think the tuition will continue rising the next years,” she said. “At first, I wanted to send my child to the school, so that she can practice English well. However, I am not sure if I have enough money for her to keep studying there.”

According to the HCM City Education and Training, every year, state owned schools in districts 1, 3 and 5 receive about 100 applications for studying at the schools from the students, who leave international schools. However, the state owned schools only receive a part of the students, who have excellent learning results, because the schools are always overloaded.

Vietnamese children may become westerners?

Equipping children with foreign language knowledge and the skills to integrate into the world is the main goal of many parents when sending their children to international schools. However, many parents have reconsidered their education plans after experts have warned that Vietnamese children may be “westernized” and become strangers at their own homes.

A lot of children can speak English fluently, but they cannot speak the mother tongue well. Especially, they do not have in-depth social knowledge.

At present, there are two kinds of international schools: the ones which absolutely teach in English and follow foreign curriculums; and the schools which follow Vietnamese curriculums, but provide intensive English lessons. At first, the former schools could only receive foreign students, but in recent years, they have been allowed to receive Vietnamese students as well.

Source: SGTT