I/Introduction:

1/Background:
Going to the university is the ultimate purpose of each Vietnamese student in high
school. However, to get in the university, Vietnamese pupils in grade 12 will have to pass the
university entrance examination (UEE) which is considered as the cornerstone of each pupil’s
life.
There are so many universities in Vietnam with a great deal of majors and subjects.
Students in grade 12 will face a crucial decision: What job they should pursue, which university
they should study or whether to go abroad for studying…
Therefore, the job orientation is the most important factor that help students answer a lot
of questions involved searching and finding a best suit job for their life.
2/Purposes:
In the fact that, many graduated students in Vietnam are unemployed and have to work in
the field, which they did not study. In contrast, many fields are very scarce labor force, for
instance auditing, banking and finance ,etc,… That is the result of the mismatch between the
social demands and the training system. In order to find out the factors effect the job choosing,
we have done this project in title:” Job orientation in advance finance program”.
3/Research questions:
Job choosing in Vietnam is a big issue. Thus, we have narrowed down the field of
research only in Advance finance class in order to answer the question:” why students choose
advance finance”,” what their future plans and dream jobs are?” and “what they are preparing
and thinking for their future life?”. After that, we propose some advice to improve the advance
program.
4/Research methods:
We did 100 surveys for 150 students in k48, 49 advanced finance class to find out how
they decided to study and what are they thinking about the program. We also interviewed some
new students in k50 about their factors affected to their job choosing. We have received back 73
over 100 surveys delivers and interviewed 10 students in K50. Therefore, the data shown in this
report is reliable.
 II/ Major finding
1. The way of advanced students choose job:
a) Why NEU, Why advance finance?
Everyone has a particular dream job, which can satisfy their hope about future life,
but not all of them really obtain it. In the life, there are many factors affect their job choices such
as interest, family, friends… Therefore, at any moment, they can decide to change their future
job, so do advance-class students. The students are studying in advance finance major, which
supply them enough knowledge about economics and business to become financial experts or
economists. Yet some of them used not to want to attend this major. From our research, most of
students did not want to study Economics or National Economics University at first. They did
want to become a doctor, a singer or a teacher instead.
There is a question “Why they change their decisions to study?” Each person has a
particular answer. To get a general answer our group brought out a question “Why they choose
advance program?" the result we received is depicted in the chart 1.

30.47

51.35

18.18
taught-by-English subject
parents' advice
others

Chart 1
 Many reasons for choosing advance program said by the students proved that although
the program is a pilot program, it has a lot of advantages. The first as well as the most import ant
advantage is that the curriculum is taught by English. This helps improve the popular weakness
about communication language of Vietnamese students. Secondly, before deciding to attend a
class like advance class students always see the syllabus which they will have to study in more
than four years. Perhaps, they found out a breakthrough in advance finance class syllabus which
helps them have a better method to get high knowledge. I can say for sure that before deciding a
university or class students have to think a lot about not only studying but also future job.
b) Factors affect job orientation
Furthermore, the way to get into a university in Vietnam is different from many countries
in the world. Students have to take a university entrance exam, and university only receives
students who have score higher than their reference score. This exam is very difficult and
students compete mutually and only good students can study in high-level university. Because of
this, the way of choosing university is very important. It is based on not only interest but also
studying level. In this case, students receive a lot of advice, even, pressure from their family. To
demonstrate for this our group asks the students a question” How do your external factors
(parents’ advice) affect your university decision?” We have the result in chart 2.

28.57
21.43

50
high external effect low external effect
no external effect

Chart 2
 The result shows us that although most students take their parents’ advice; the final
decision is given by them. It means that the students still keep thinking about their future, and
they receive actively external factors. In our interview, I am so impressed by a statement of a
student in advance class “The best strategy for a person future is the strategy created by him, not
other people, because nobody understands him better than himself.” It is also the thinking of
other students in advance class. Another student described his process of choosing university and
major. Firstly, he had to consider many universities among foreign trade university, commercial
university national economics university. Although all of them teach students mainly about
economic field; each university has particular features, and the most difference between them is
reference score. After that, he must face the issue which major is best for them. In the short time,
a load of ideas appeared in his mind, so he had to take one of them. No decision is easy because
it relates to his future. Despite of taking parents’ advice, he must decide by himself the final
selection. After the survey we have a positive thinking about job orientation of the advance
students. They no longer receive passively external advice, they always try to find out which way
is suitable for their ability, aptitude. Our survey results demonstrate that although they become
more and more independent from their family, they are willing to take advantage of selected
external advices. I can make sure that Vietnamese students in general and advance finance
students in particular have enough quality to become international students who play an
important role in the global economics integration of Vietnam.
In general, students have to spend a lot of time searching which university or class
is good for them. An appropriate university choice will help student have a higher job
opportunity in future. Yet, nothing is windfall, students have to search actively for their own
opportunity; no one can help except themselves.
2. Advance students’ thinking
As we have mentioned above, every young student in advanced class had to search
a lot of information and asked people around them to decide what they want to do and
which university is suitable for them.
Because of this, all of them are expected to achieve much from the class, especially from
the professors…In the survey, when were asked about how they satisfied with advanced
program? .37 % people do not satisfy with the class and only 27 % say they are pleased. One
reason makes them disappointed is bad schedule: the time table is too difficult for students to
make a good plan for study and time was wasted for some other reasons but not for study. A
student said, “I had to wake up at 6 am to go to school but there’re only 2 periods in the
morning” and certainly he had to wait for the next class in the afternoon. Another main reason is
the instructors who help students study, some of them are not experience enough to raise the
ambition on their students and the result is many lectures were boring and difficult to understand.
It is really a serious problem for the class so we need some changes from people who have the
right to choose the tutors or teachers for classes.
Nevertheless, 27% of advanced students said besides this weak point, the class also have
advantages like studying condition, professors from foreign country and students have chances to
contact with new studying methods. Indeed, every class used by advanced class has the air
conditioning and the language used in class is English. That is special in a Vietnamese
university. Therefore, they believed they had chosen the right university, especially the program.

How Well Can You Use English ?

8% 4%

88%

Use English Fluently Use English Normally Can't use English well

Advanced students had been studying for two year and based on the result of the
surveillance, 3.7 % said they can use English fluently, the percentage of students who could use
English normally is very high-88.8 percent. That is good news for the program and the students.
 Are you studying other languages ?

Chinese Japanese French or German None

50%

1.01%
1
15.66%

33.33%

0.00% 10.00% 20.00% 30.00% 40.00% 50.00% 60.00%

According to the research, all of the students wanted to succeed in the future but only
32.14 % people thought they would do well after graduation and 25.06% did not know. It is
reflect that not all of the students thought that they had enough what they needed for future.
Thus, they wanted to study some other languages such as Chinese, Japanese….It is a good way
to ensure that they could have a good job in the future but some students cared about the real
experience so they chose part-time jobs. There are many difference kinds of part-time jobs :
writing for a newspaper , teaching English ….They could choose various activities to work or to
learn but what they did would help them much to create a dynamic style of living and contact
with the real world.
Students have to do many works a day, how they plan their time with a unexpected
schedule and part- time jobs? There are many difference answers but all of them have to accept
that makes a good plan to allocate time effectively is very difficult. Indeed, make a plan is the
most difficult part for any kinds of work. So what they need to learn? When were asked this
question many of them said that they need the soft-skill to arrange their time better and besides
this the soft-skill can teach them more like presentation , leadership how to influence people and
encourage them to do what you want….
 Studying in finance and working with English, which is not their mother tongue, is the
main difficult point for everyone in the class and the organizers are working with all of their
potential to make the best condition for the students who are expected to be successful after the
university.
3. Future Plan:
a. Career objectives:
According to the survey on members of advanced program, 50 percents of the
students said that they wanted to get a job right after graduation. This might be concluded
that their objectives were to make ends meet and to have a stable life. Vietnam is a country
with a very young population (52 million people of working age), there are so many people
are waiting to be employed while there is not enough for all of them. Getting a job becomes
the final goal of many students and it was the reason why they attended to universities. From
the chart below, it can be showed that there were many students who wanted to study more
(right after university or after getting a job). It is easy to understand, they needed more
knowledge to get a higher position in their workplace or to earn money easier. In market
economy, knowledge is known as the key to success of many businesspersons.

What is your future plan after graduation?

Get a job right away Study more Get a job then continue study Not sure

9.38%

12.50%

28.12%

50%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60%

Only a few people had the answer “not sure” in this question, they might not have
decided yet because they are still confused between studying and getting a job.
 If students still wanted to continue studying, it was a good idea to improve their knowledge. The
better they learned, the easier they would get their future jobs. Yet, the bottom line here is they still had to
face the challenges of finding jobs. In this section, we are going to talk more about advanced students’
idea of their dream jobs.
b. Future jobs:
There were not many students answered this question (only 47.58%). It could be
explained that the others were not ready to decide which firms they would work for in the
future, it’s still to early for them to make up their mind.

Where do you want to work in the future?

27%

11.76%

8.82%

0.00% 5.00% 10.00% 15.00% 20.00% 25.00% 30.00%

States Companies Private Companies International Companies

Based on the statistics illustrated in the graph, we can have a conclusion that there were
three big trends in choosing jobs: State Companies, Private Companies and International
Companies.
+ State Companies: these are firms possessed by the government. A small number (8.82
%) of advanced students chose to work for these enterprises for stable life with the salary came
from the government. They would not be worried about bankruptcy but they might have to face
the fact is low salary even though they were very skilled. According to the statistics, it seems that
our students did not very like working for the state companies. Low income might not be fair to
advanced students who had very good knowledge.
 + Private Companies: the problem of inequality between salaries and abilities, and the
need of freedom in workplace were the reason why 11.76 % of students would like to work for
private companies. Their income would be higher than in state companies and they would get
what they deserved. But they might have more risk because nobody could make sure their
enterprises’ existence, they could run very well this Monday but who could know whether next
Monday they would go bankrupt or not.
+ The graph has shown a good picture about advanced student that a large number of
them chose international enterprises. They must be confident, highly skilled and especially very
good at English- the most important criteria to work for foreigners. Working for foreign firms
might put on a lot of pressure but in return, they could get very high salaries, which they
deserved, experiences and qualities of workplaces that they would never have in domestic
companies.

III/Conclusion
Vietnam is an emerging economy, which need a lot of skilled work force. In fact, many
branches in Vietnam are lack of human resources; whereas, graduated students cannot find the
best suitable job to pursue. Therefore, Job orientation is essential and crucial to help the training
system meet the social demand.
Job orientation is not only necessary for pupils in grade 12 but also needed for students in
university who are going to work. According to our survey, over 40 % of advanced finance
students are not sure about their future job after graduating is really an alerting figure. Therefore,
university must orientate students to the jobs that based on their own strength and interest.
This is an expectation of a student from advance finance intake 48:” I hope that our
program would have a good relationship with enterprises and provide more chance for student to
have the internship in those enterprises. Those opportunities are precious for students to practice
and to experience the real life activities rather than the theories in books. Program should have
more stable timetable for students to attend some extra class for studying some soft skills or a
new language.” Trần thị Hải Vân advanced finance k48
Advanced finance is a good program. But, can the graduated students from advanced
finance be success is based on the preparation and orientation from today.
 Appendix
Job orientation

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