The administration of Jakarta, Indonesia, plans to arrange for students from low-income families to attend up to 1,000 private schools for free in the next academic year, aiming to prevent them from dropping out because of financial problems amid the limited number of public schools.

Record heat in the Philippines in April has forced schools to send children home for online classes.

Hanoi’s Department of Education and Training has collaborated with departments and agencies to rebuild the school planning network and reassess projects that did not meet requirements in order to reclaim land funds and utilise them for school construction.

Hanoi is trying to have 80 - 85% of local public schools meeting national standards by 2025, according to a plan recently issued by the municipal People’s Committee.

As of 2019, Vietnam counted five foreign invested universities, 68 private schools and 170 public ones.

Nguyen Thi Phuong, who has worked at the Thang Long Industrial Park in Hanoi’s outskirts district of Dong Anh for years, said her family of three would enjoy a stable life if not for housing.

Hanoi and HCM City are both rolling experiments in granting more autonomy to public schools in hopes of improving educational quality and reducing the schools’ reliance on the State budget.

The Ministry of Education and Training has proposed free tuition for all public elementary and secondary schools as “an appropriate mechanism” for universalising access to education in Vietnam.

The news that reputed public schools in the capital city of Hanoi will increase their tuition fees further in the next academic year has made many parents worried.

The Singaporean Ministry of Education (MOE) said on October 11 it will increase the tuition fee of international students in public schools since the school year of 2017.

All public schools in Ho Chi Minh City will be required to teach swimming beginning in the 2016-17 school year under a new directive from the city’s Department of Education and Training.