Problems with the education system

Rural inequalities and gender differences

Problems with the education system

Although the Vietnamese education system is on a promising path, there are still large gaps between parts of the country with different ethnic groups, and between men and women.

Only five percent of Vietnamese people don’t attend school at all, and the figure is becoming lower for every upcoming generation. The literacy rate is over 90%, and the spatial and gender inequalities are decreasing. But Vietnam still hasn’t managed to eradicate them completely.

In general, there are three kinds of noticeable inequalities: a disparity between north and south, one between cities and rural areas, and a smaller and decreasing difference between men and women. Some minorities have a significantly higher rate of illiteracy. Over 50% of the Hmong tribe, and about a quarter of the Khmer and Thai minorities, are not able to read and write.

Those disparities are bad, but were worse in past decades. A huge effort from the government, and more spendings on education, has helped to reduce them. The next step would be to wipe them out completely, but that is going to take a while.

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