Schools and teachers do not enjoy

The 2023-2024 school year has just ended, and parents of students at Phan Dinh Giot Primary School (Thanh Xuan District, Hanoi) were given registration forms to buy textbooks for the 2024-2025 school year (the Connecting Knowledge with Life book series).

For example, in the list of textbooks registered for grade 5 in the 2024-2025 school year, there are 22 textbooks and exercise books. The total value of this set of books is 448 thousand VND and so far, parents who registered to buy the books have paid in full. According to calculations, the book set Connecting knowledge with life (excluding exercise books and supplementary books), if the lowest discount is 11%, the "commission" amount deducted by the publishing unit is equivalent to 49.28 thousand VND/set.

According to the reporter's research, the school's enrollment target for grade 1 in the 2023-2024 school year is 360 students. If enough students are recruited every year, it is estimated that the whole school will have about 1,800 students. Thus, it is estimated that each year, the percentage of distribution fees from purchasing textbooks calculated on the total number of students purchasing books is about 80 million VND.

Ms. Nguyen Thi Kim Ngoc, Principal of Phan Dinh Giot Primary School, said that the school's library department will be responsible for purchasing textbooks for the new school year based on student registration. Textbooks are purchased according to the instructions of the Thanh Xuan District Department of Education and Training on the content and list of books for each subject. When asked about discounts on textbooks, Ms. Ngoc said, "the school does not receive any benefits." That means teachers also do not receive a percentage of the book distribution fee.

Since the end of the previous school year, first graders of the Ly Thai To Education System (Cau Giay, Hanoi) have been given a list of books to register for in the 2024-2025 school year. In this list, there are 21 books, nearly half of which are exercise books from the Connecting Knowledge with Life series. By May 12, parents had completed their registration to buy books and paid the homeroom teacher.

The price of each book is the same as the listed price of the publisher. The total value of the book set is 351 thousand VND. Based on the percentage of the discounted publishing fee (lowest 11%), each set of books that students receive a discount of 38.6 thousand VND. According to research, the enrollment target for grade 1 of the primary school system in 2024 is 320 students. The entire primary school in the school is estimated to have 1,600 students, equivalent to a discounted amount of about 61 million VND.

Speaking to Tien Phong reporter, the principal of another private school said that the school enjoys a discount when buying books. According to the disclosure of a principal of a private school in Hanoi, the school buys books according to the instructions of the education department and the discount percentage from textbooks for the school is only from 5% to 7%. However, usually every year, the number of students registering to study is different and uneven, so the percentage of the distribution fee is deducted to compensate for the excess textbooks purchased or textbooks for teachers to research and teach.

Publishers need to disclose percentages

In the 2023-2024 school year, Hanoi has 145 high schools, 826 primary schools, 675 secondary schools with about 2.3 million students. Thus, the amount of discount from textbooks for students in Hanoi is estimated to be up to tens of billions of VND. According to statistics from the Ministry of Education and Training, in the 2023-2024 school year, there will be 6.5 million secondary school students, 2.9 million high school students and 8.9 million primary school students. Thus, the market for textbooks and exercise books has about 18.3 million customers.

Based on the above list of parents' book registrations, we tentatively calculate the average of all textbooks for all classes, including the current program and the new program, at a price of about 350,000 VND/set of books/student, then the amount of money parents may have to spend in 1 year is over 6.4 trillion VND. And if we calculate the lowest discount rate of 11%, the discount amount is also about more than 700 billion VND.

Speaking to reporters, Dr. Nguyen Tung Lam, Chairman of the Hanoi Educational Psychology Association, said that selling textbooks follows the rules of goods distribution, has a discount rate and is allowed. This is a way to operate faster and better.

“However, publishers must publicly disclose the percentages for each department, such as the district education department, the school, and the teachers, to be fair and transparent. This is a right that all participants deserve, and cannot be left as it is now. A secret agreement or focusing on one person is unfair,” Dr. Lam suggested.