Students at the Tân Sơn Nhì Primary School in HCM City's Tân Phú District. — VNA/VNS Photo Thu Hoài

HCM CITY — The number of students from kindergarten to high school in HCM City will increase by 22,000 in the upcoming 2022-23 academic year, according to the city’s Department of Education and Training.

Hồ Tấn Minh, Chief of the Office of the department, said among the additional students, there are 15,282 students in public schools and 6,543 students in non-public schools.

The increase is mostly at pre-schools, secondary schools, and high schools in Thủ Đức City and the districts of Bình Tân, Bình Chánh, Hóc Môn and 12 which are in the process of rapid urbanisation and population growth.

In the 2021-22 academic year, nearly 344,000 students were not in the city's household registration book. This pressure has caused an increase in the number of students in classes exceeding the standard number of students per classroom.

Many primary schools have more than 45 students per classroom, affecting the quality of management and teaching.

By September, the city plans to put into use 575 new classrooms, including 210 rooms for kindergartens, 218 rooms for primary schools and 147 rooms for secondary school.

In the 2022-23 academic year, the city needs to recruit 892 pre-school teachers, 2,355 primary school teachers, 1,698 secondary school teachers and 296 high school teachers.

However, many schools are still facing difficulties in recruiting teachers in several subjects, especially English, informatics, music, and fine arts.

Pedagogical universities were not interested in training human resources in these subjects, or lack the pedagogical skills required, Minh said.

The department has ordered the pedagogical universities to provide teacher training courses for artists and artisans holding bachelor and masters degrees in these majors, he said.

According to reports of education leaders of some provinces and cities at a recent conference to summarise the 2021-2022 academic year and implement the tasks of the 2022-23 academic year held by the Ministry of Education and Training, the education sector is short of teaching staff because of low wages.

According to the ministry, the number of teachers per grade has not met the requirements under the new education programme.

Experts have also pointed out the pressure of rapid population growth is leading to a high number of students per class in urban areas and industrial zones of some localities and big cities such as Hà Nội, HCM City, Hải Phòng city, and Bình Dương and Đồng Nai provinces.

The Politburo has decided to supplement 65,980 additional teachers to localities for the period of 2022-2026. — VNS