Candidates of the 2019 national high school exam.

Da Nang City and Quang Nam Province’s administration yesterday asked the Ministry of Education to cancel the upcoming 2020 national high school exam due to the complex developments of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 2020 national high school exam is scheduled to be held across the country on August 9 and 10.

As of yesterday, the number of people who have tested positive for coronavirus in Việt Nam has reached 546 after 85 new community transmissions were detected in Đà Nẵng City, while a 70-year-old man from the Quảng Nam's Hoi An Town became the first death related to COVID-19 yesterday.

Lê Trung Chinh, deputy chairman of the city People’s Committee, told an online meeting held yesterday by the education ministry with 63 provinces and cities nationwide to discuss preparation for the upcoming national high school exam that the city’s education and training sector would determine whether a student qualifies for graduation based on their performance in high school.

Chinh also asked the ministry and colleges and universities to create favourable conditions for local students when they applied for college or university entrance. Many universities use the results of the exam for selection of their new recruits so those who do not take the exam might be at a disadvantage.

“It is a hard decision for the local administration," he said.

Although the city had prepared carefully for the upcoming high school exam, both parents and students were still worried about the health of the students while the pandemic’s developments became more complicated.

Therefore, the cancellation was necessary "because of the students’ health and safety,” he said.

Also at the meeting, deputy chairman of the People’s Committee of Quảng Nam Province Trần Văn Tân proposed three options to the ministry for consideration.

First, the province would continue to monitor the situation of the pandemic until August 6. If the situation was under control, the province would hold the 2020 national high school exam as scheduled.

Second, Tân proposed the ministry allow the province to hold the exam a month later. The third option was cancelling the exam and using the same model as Đà Nẵng to determine who graduates.

Ngô Văn Quý, deputy chairman of the People’s Committee of Hà Nội, said although the capital was one of the localities with the highest number of candidates sitting the exam, preparations had been finished.

However, Quý asked the Ministry of Health to issue more detailed instructions for disinfection, ensuring distance among candidates in the examination room, how to organise students moving in and out of the room to avoid cross-contamination as well as how to set up separate examination rooms for candidates who had directly contacted people positive for SARS-CoV-2.

Dương Anh Đức, deputy chairman of the People’s Committee of HCM City, said he was very concerned about marking the tests, which would gather about 600 teachers in one place.

It would violate the regulation of not gathering more than 30 people during the pandemic, so the ministries of health and education should give more specific instructions, he said.

Ministries’ response

Nguyễn Hữu Độ, deputy minister of Education and Training, said he would submit the proposals to the Government for consideration.  

Phùng Xuân Nhạ, minister of Education and Training, said the ministry had worked with relevant ministries and sectors to carefully prepare for the exam.

This is the first time Government inspectors had participated in supervising the exam’s implementation, he added.

Nhạ said there was more than a week left, so every locality was told to closely monitor the pandemic’s developments to promptly issue necessary responses.

For Đà Nẵng and Quảng Nam, he ordered the localities to keep calm, closely monitor the pandemic’s development and prioritise students’ health and safety.

Candidates nationwide are set to sit the exam on August 9 and 10. —VNS