Students at the Đồng Nai Medical College. — Photo laodong.vn

ĐỒNG NAI — In recent years, Đồng Nai Medical College has been struggling to enrol enough students in its nursery and midwifery majors, often only reaching 50-60 per cent of training capacity.

The Đồng Nai Medical College trains in six different professions of which nursing is the key occupation at the ASEAN level. Three others, pharmacy, rehabilitation skills and medical testing skills, are key occupations at the national level.

In the past few years, the number of students applying for nursing and midwifery majors has decreased.

However, this wasn't always the case.

In 2017 and 2018, the number of enrollments in these two disciplines exceeded the target with 300 nursing students and 200 midwifery students.

However, from 2019, students registered for the nursing and midwifery majors began to decrease, a trend that continued during the pandemic.

The nursing major last year only had 120 students, while the midwifery major only had seven.

"Local hospitals and medical facilities still need more nurses and midwives, so although the college can recruit very few students, it still organises teaching and training," said Nguyễn Lương Thao, deputy principal of the college.

For the 2022-2023 school year, the Đồng Nai Medical College set an enrollment target of 200 students for nursing and 50 for midwifery.

Although the situation is better than last year, the nursing faculty has only 100 admissions, and the midwifery has only 10.

"The low number of students enrolled affects the school's training plan because it previously arranged a sufficient number of lecturers. If it does not recruit enough students, the teachers will not have enough teaching hours as regulated, and will have to do some other tasks," said Thao.

The college is currently finding ways to recruit more students.

The Đồng Nai Medical College is a public school in the southern province of Đồng Nai. Its school fees are based on the province’s regulations. Fees for the nursing and midwifery major are no more than VNĐ10 million (US$424) per year.

Thao said that although the school’s training quality is always guaranteed and all graduates find jobs, the low-income and high-pressure work puts many people off.

Most people that study these courses do so because of their passion or family tradition.

Faced with the above difficulties, as well as diversifying enrollment methods, the college has different policies to attract students, including scholarships, improving teaching quality and combining theory at the school and practice at the hospital.

The college has a good relationship with hospitals, inviting head nurses and medical staff with a high level of expertise to guide its students to give them confidence in their professional ability when graduating from school. — VNS