16,000 teachers quit in 2022

At a meeting with constituents of Hanoi’s Ha Dong District on Friday, Minister of Education and Training Nguyen Kim Son said Vietnam now has around 1.6 million teachers and lacks more than 100,000.

Yet so far this year, 16,000 have quit, or one in every 100 teachers, he said.

Particularly for preschools, some provinces have no source of staff to recruit from while many people choose to do other jobs that secure them a higher income.

He said it is a hard job to teach at preschools as the pressure is high, but the pay is low. Newcomers are normally paid VND3-4.5 million ($125.71-188.56) per month.

“Some teachers have found other jobs, or moved to the private education system,” he said.

Constituent Dao Van Phe said some localities now have a serious shortage of teachers because of unreasonable regimes and policies, and unsatisfactory salaries.

Some teachers have quit their jobs because they remained on temporary contracts for too long and did not get on the official payroll despite being very passionate about their job.

Minister Son said he would petition the central government to increase the staffing quota.

For many years, the education sector was not allowed to add more teachers to the official payroll. Those working under temporary contracts will not receive benefits such as social insurance.