Higher education curriculum reforms in Vietnam in the era of globalization

The era of globalization was marked for Vietnam since the late 1980s when the country opened its doors to welcome exchanges with the rest of the world. Many reform agenda have consequently been set for all sectors, including higher education. While there has been accumulative research on Vietnamese higher education reform agendas, this chapter focuses on major curriculum changes over the last four decades against the globalization backdrop, in terms of national-level policy making and institutional-level curriculum development and implementation. The changes will be described through document analysis of higher education curriculum policies promulgated between 1980 and 2020, university curricula and their reports on curriculum matters within this time frame. The impacts of globalization on curriculum reforms in Vietnam as well as its nexus with higher education policy making will be revealed through discussing achievements, challenges, and paradoxes in advancing university curriculum. Such discussions will hopefully provide policymakers with useful knowledge about what Vietnam has yet to do in its on-going reform agenda. Copyright © 2022 Springer Nature Switzerland AG.