The Vietnam School Readiness Promotion Project launched onSeptember 19 aims to raise school readiness for five-year-old childrenfrom disadvantaged groups and ethnic minorities.
Improving education outcomes for the population is an important part ofVietnam's economic and social development agenda, and has beendefined as one of the three breakthrough areas in its Socio-EconomicDevelopment Strategy for 2011-2020.
Investing in earlychildhood education is a key step towards building high quality humanresources as Vietnam strives to become a modern, industrialisedmarket economy.
"Overwhelming evidence from around theworld shows that many of the thinking and language skills as well associal and behavioral skills are formed in the early years of a child'slife," said Xiaoqing Yu, human development sector director for the WorldBank in East Asia and the Pacific region.
"If youwant to make education more equitable, if you want to enhance everyone'schances to take advantage from Vietnam's growing economy, if youwant to tackle poverty, early childhood development and education is oneof your most promising tools."
According to a surveyintroduced at the launch, about half of Vietnam's five-year-olds areat risk of lacking at least one area of skill needed to startschooling.
The Early Development Instrument survey,conducted by the Ministry of Education and Training, RussiaEducation Aid for Development, Canada's Offord Institute and theWorld Bank, also shows that the percentage of children not ready forschool is highest in children of ethnic minorities and of disadvantagedbackgrounds.
The project is designed to address thisproblem by raising school readiness for children entering primaryeducation, through supporting selected elements of Vietnam's nationalprogramme on "Universal Early Childhood Education for 5 year oldChildren 2010-2015" (Decision 239).
The projectsupports efforts to expand full-day pre-school enrollments, improvecapacity for pre-school quality assurance and strengthen professionalexpertise of teachers and principals.
The funding of100 million USD for this project comes from the InternationalDevelopment Association, the World Bank's concessional lending arm forpoor countries.-VNA
Improving education outcomes for the population is an important part ofVietnam's economic and social development agenda, and has beendefined as one of the three breakthrough areas in its Socio-EconomicDevelopment Strategy for 2011-2020.
Investing in earlychildhood education is a key step towards building high quality humanresources as Vietnam strives to become a modern, industrialisedmarket economy.
"Overwhelming evidence from around theworld shows that many of the thinking and language skills as well associal and behavioral skills are formed in the early years of a child'slife," said Xiaoqing Yu, human development sector director for the WorldBank in East Asia and the Pacific region.
"If youwant to make education more equitable, if you want to enhance everyone'schances to take advantage from Vietnam's growing economy, if youwant to tackle poverty, early childhood development and education is oneof your most promising tools."
According to a surveyintroduced at the launch, about half of Vietnam's five-year-olds areat risk of lacking at least one area of skill needed to startschooling.
The Early Development Instrument survey,conducted by the Ministry of Education and Training, RussiaEducation Aid for Development, Canada's Offord Institute and theWorld Bank, also shows that the percentage of children not ready forschool is highest in children of ethnic minorities and of disadvantagedbackgrounds.
The project is designed to address thisproblem by raising school readiness for children entering primaryeducation, through supporting selected elements of Vietnam's nationalprogramme on "Universal Early Childhood Education for 5 year oldChildren 2010-2015" (Decision 239).
The projectsupports efforts to expand full-day pre-school enrollments, improvecapacity for pre-school quality assurance and strengthen professionalexpertise of teachers and principals.
The funding of100 million USD for this project comes from the InternationalDevelopment Association, the World Bank's concessional lending arm forpoor countries.-VNA
