"Without ever practicing for SAT or IELTS, it will be difficult to do the graduation exam in English"

If you have never practiced SAT or IELTS, it will be difficult to do the graduation English test.

For more than 12 hours, Ms. HMP - an English teacher in Hanoi - has not taken her hands off her phone. Students and parents have been texting her to confide in her. Some students cried after checking the answers and calculating their scores with her.

“I reassured my children that it is normal for the exam to be difficult. Difficult ones are generally difficult, easy ones are generally easy. The chance of getting into university has not changed. However, the psychology of students and parents is really not good. It has been a long time since I have seen an exam end with such a heavy burden,” Ms. P. confided.

According to Ms. P., most of her students scored 6.5-7 points. There are 3 students in the class who scored 8-8.5 points. All 3 students have IELTS certificates of 7.0 and 7.5.

Ms. P. commented that although the test closely followed the sample structure, the difficulty level was increased significantly. The content and complexity of the reading passages in the test were a difficult challenge to overcome if candidates had never encountered the types of reading passages in the IELTS or SAT tests.

At the same time, the reading content is highly practical, requiring students to have solid language knowledge, combining social understanding and logical thinking, not simply grammar and vocabulary knowledge as before.

“I joked with the students that this year's high school graduation English exam was quite easy, but only easy for English major students.

If you have never practiced SAT or IELTS, you will not be able to do this graduation English test with a score of 7. If you only practice within the scope of knowledge of the general education program, the score you will achieve will only be around 5-6 points.

Even students with IELTS 6.5 and score 8 need to stand on tiptoe,” said Ms. P.

Sharing the same view, Master Hoang Duc Long - who has many years of experience teaching English, teaching academic writing and critical thinking - commented: "The exam is easy for those who have experience and test-taking techniques and problem-solving skills, to adapt to many types of questions, and at the same time have very rich language knowledge: understanding of both professional and common language, familiar with many types of documents, from emails to essays expressing personal opinions, social argumentative essays.

For excellent students, who are not only proficient in general education knowledge but also proficient in academic English (level C1 in the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages), this exam is at an appropriate level, not easy.

For students who are only loyal to the ministry's general education program, this exam is really difficult."

The English graduation exam is as difficult as IELTS, is it true that the chance of getting into university does not change?

Contrary to Ms. HMP's thinking that difficult exams will not change candidates' chances of getting into university, Master Hoang Duc Long has a different perspective.

According to Mr. Long, the advantage belongs to candidates who invest finance and time to study additional academic English programs, of which IELTS preparation is an example.

“Families that can afford to send their children to study academic English content outside of the textbook program will have higher test results. Students who come from families that do not have the financial means and time to diversify their study program will have lower results.

Meanwhile, the results of this exam are one of the important bases for university admission. Therefore, I think there is reason to worry that: the opportunity to continue the educational path will increase significantly for the group of students from families with good economic and social conditions, and the opportunity will decrease significantly for the group of disadvantaged students," Mr. Long analyzed.

In this year's university entrance exam, a notable new point in the regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training (MOET) is that schools are allowed to convert foreign language certificates into English exam scores in the admission combination.

For example, with the IELTS certificate alone, there are about 42 universities in the North that accept conversion to English subject scores, including most of the top schools.

Most of the schools on this list count 10 points for IELTS from 7.0 and above.

There is a school that calculates 10 points for IELTS from 5.0, which is the University of Commerce.

With IELTS 6.5, candidates can get the lowest converted score of 8 points at the Diplomatic Academy, 8.5 points at the Foreign Trade University, 9 points at the National Economics University, 9.5 points at 12 schools under the National University and 10 points at Hanoi University of Science and Technology.

Meanwhile, as Ms. HMP commented, students with 6.5 only scored about 8 points on the 2025 high school graduation English exam.

The certificate score conversion table announced by schools is calculated based on many factors, including the average score range of the high school graduation exam in English in previous years.

Although this year's results are not yet available, it can be estimated that there will be a significant difference between the English scores converted from the certificate and the English scores of the candidates' graduation exams.

This will cause unfairness. Because with the same graduation exam score, candidates with international language certificates will be considered for admission with higher scores than candidates without foreign language certificates.

For example, candidate A and candidate B both scored 8 points in English on the high school graduation exam, and were both admitted to Hanoi University of Science and Technology with group A01. However, because A has an IELTS certificate of 6.5, A is given 10 points in English; B does not have a certificate, B's English score is still 8.

On the afternoon of June 27, Dan Tri reporter raised this issue with the Ministry of Education and Training. Is it still appropriate for schools to convert English certificate scores before the high school graduation exam results are available, and will the Ministry intervene in this conversion table in the upcoming university entrance exam?

Answering the above question, Associate Professor, Dr. Nguyen Anh Dung - Deputy Director of the Department of Higher Education, Ministry of Education and Training - said: Up to this point, all information and assessments are still initial assessments.

In principle, university admissions will have to follow regulations, including IELTS score conversion. The Ministry will continue to coordinate with training institutions to implement this conversion to ensure fairness for candidates.

Source: https://dantri.com.vn/giao-duc/chua-tung-luyen-thi-sat-ielts-se-kho-lam-noi-de-tot-nghiep-mon-tieng-anh-20250628001708301.htm