Quick notes after the first exam day of the second round

If this morning (July 9, 2008), the candidates seemed quite satisfied with the Literature exam, then in the afternoon, the History exam results were not very positive for many candidates.

According to our observations, when 2/3 of the time was up, about ten candidates submitted their papers and 15 minutes later (at 4:30), about 10 more candidates submitted their papers early. However, when asked, the candidates all said that their test results were not good. According to general comments, this year's History exam was a bit long, leaning more towards memorization than providing analytical opinions and comments to assess the candidates' ability to synthesize. However, the exam only included knowledge in the compulsory part of the textbook.

Candidate named Yen in exam room 226, exam site G, University of Social Sciences and Humanities left the exam room early and said: “This year's History exam was easier than last year's, but I still didn't have complete confidence in my answer. The world history question was "off the mark" when it asked about the influence of the Allies on the resistance of the Vietnamese people.”. Yen also shared: this year is the 5th year she has taken the university entrance exam and all the entrance exams are for the University of Social Sciences and Humanities (VNU). She is currently studying Intermediate Accounting at Hanoi Trade Union University and this year she is trying to take the exam again in the hope of becoming a student in the field of Archival Studies and Office Administration. When asked more about the reason for not doing well on the test, candidate Yen did not hesitate to say: “It's all up to us. If we learn it by heart, we can do any kind of test. Because I was studying and working at the same time, I only had 1 month to review for the exam, so I couldn't finish it all.”. Yen also predicted her exam score to be around 6 to 7 points.

Similar to Yen's opinion, other candidates when asked all commented that the exam was normal, not difficult if they grasped the basic knowledge. However, many candidates said that they could not do the test or could not do it all, the main reason was because... they did not know all the knowledge in the books or had learned it but... forgot. Most candidates predicted that their score would only be around 5 to 6 points. That shows that up to now, History is still a difficult subject for students and the main reason is that they do not have the right way to study and do not really love History.

According to supervisor Luong Thuy Lien (exam site G, University of Social Sciences and Humanities), this year's exam, candidates followed the exam regulations quite seriously. That is probably partly due to the annual "tradition", the exam sites of the University of Social Sciences and Humanities (VNU) are "famous" for being serious and following the regulations. However, Ms. Lien also said that the phenomenon of candidates being confused in writing information on the exam paper and in submitting the exam is very common.

According to preliminary statistics, this afternoon there were 5,677 candidates taking the exam (10 less than in the morning), 02 were reprimanded and 02 were suspended.

Update: According to the official report on the History exam on the afternoon of July 9, 5,766 candidates took the exam (68.4% pass rate), 6 candidates were reprimanded, 2 were warned, and 8 candidates were suspended.