VietNamNet Bridge – Spelling mistakes have been discovered everywhere, on university degrees, and at the traffic signboards or at the airports. The mistakes, in the eyes of educators, are odd and unacceptable.

On July 1, 2013, the University of Science, belonging to the Thai Nguyen University, granted a school graduation ceremony, in which 700 university degrees were handed over to 700 new graduates.

However, the original degrees have been found as having no anti-counterfeiting stamps issued by the Ministry of Education and Training. Meanwhile, the duplicates have been found as containing spelling mistakes in the title of the school’s president.

“The serious mistakes have put big difficulties for us when applying for jobs. We have been suspected of using counterfeit degrees,” a school’s graduate complained.

On July 17, Vice President of the University of Sciences admitted the mistakes in the duplicates, made by the school’s students’ affairs division. Meanwhile, “since students left right after they received the degrees, therefore, the stamps have not been stuck yet.”

According to Le Hai Bang, Head of the Students’ Affairs Division, besides the above said mistakes, some degrees do not have the reference numbers. The school would release a notice to recall the degrees with mistakes and it would grant others free of charge.

Dat Viet newspaper has reported that hundreds of the master degrees of the Hanoi Journalism and Communication Academy have been recalled because of the spelling mistakes.

The 270 new masters, after receiving the degrees on April 18, discovered mistakes in the English version of the degrees. The words should have been “The director of Academy of Journalism and Communication.” However, “derector” was there instead of “director.”

A similar case occurred at the HCM City Industry University. The graduates then discovered a serious spelling mistake in the name of their training major. Instead of “Biotechnology”, the degrees wrote “Biotechnogy.”

The spelling mistakes on the school degrees have raised big worries about the capability and the lack of responsibility of universities, the high level training establishments.

In fact, spelling mistakes can be found everywhere on the streets, from the signboards to the bus stations or the airports. However, educators believe that such mistakes must not made by education and training establishments.

At the Tan Son Nhat International Airport, where people believe the English needs to be standard because it receives a lot of foreign travelers, a lot of odd spelling mistakes were still made. Instead of “information,” travelers saw “infornation.”

Who to blame?

No one could imagine that such mistakes were made by the Academy for Journalism and Communication, the school which teaches to write properly.

“The mistakes are unacceptable,” said Associate Professor and Dr. Nguyen Huu Dat. “The person who signed the document was really irresponsible.”

He went on to say that the university degree and master degree are not only the face of the schools, but they also show the images of the country. “What will foreigners think about Vietnamese education quality when they see the degrees with the mistakes?” Dat said.

“The learners might have felt sad, because their knowledge obtained after many years of learning hard has been recognized by the degree with defects,” he added, calling on to set up a mechanism which allows disciplining the heads of the schools for the mistakes.

Dat Viet