The process of building and development

1. The process of establishing Hanoi Open University

In the late 1980s and early 1990s many universities in our country have introduced "extended" training (allowing students to register freely without necessarily passing the exam through national entrance examination). However, from 1993 - 1994, the State has allowed universities and colleges to proactively propose recruitment quotas to exploit their training capacity to meet social demands. Existence in a school of both formal and extended form is clearly not necessary. Therefore, from this school year, the Ministry of Education and Training has decided to stop expanding the training system in universities. At the same time, the educational experience in the countries of the world shows that to meet the learning needs of society, to create opportunities for many classes of people to receive university education but still ensure quality of the output. It is possible to open a free enrollment form but focus on private universities called "Open University".

For these reasons, on November 3, 1993, the Prime Minister issued Decision No. 535/TTg to establish Hanoi Open University (HOU) with the functions and duties as follows:

- To be a university training institution and study open training, distance training and on-the-job training so as to meet the diversified demands of the society, thus contributing to increasing the scientific and technical capacity of scientific and technical personnel for country;

- Being a unit operating in the system of universities directly managed by the Ministry of Education and Training and entitled to all statutes of a public university.

2. Activities of HOU

2.1. Training and retraining activities

In order to fulfill the mission entrusted by the Party and the State, HOU has continuously developed and expanded its scale, training as well as diversifying the types of training.

Formal training of the university has increasingly confirmed the quality, attracting more and more students to study. The number of students entering the school has always reached the assigned target. Institutional training in 12 branches with 17 majors: Business Administration; Business Administration - Tourism - Hotel; Tourguide; Accountant; English language; Chinese language; Information Technology; Biotechnology; Electronics Engineering - Communication Technology; Architecture; Graphics; Furniture; Fashion; Finance-Banking; Economic law; International law; Jurisprudence. Training institutes for eight majors: business administration; Electronics Engineering; Biotechnology; English Language and Economic Law; Accountant; Information Technology; Telecommunications Engineering and Doctorate Degree in English Language.

HOU has become a multi-disciplinary and multi-level with a wide range of training programs, including formal training, on-the-job training, in-service training and distance training. The training scale of the Institute in the school year 2015-2016 is 32,855 students (of which formal training: 11,299, distance: 20,287, other systems: 1,299 students).

Over the past two decades, the university has trained and provided to the society over 150,000 bachelors, engineers, architects and masters. In addition, the university has combined with institutes and military schools to train and award General undergraduate certificates to thousands of officer cadets. The university has also offered courses of Informatics Office, Basic English, Vocational Certificate for subjects with long-term needs. Most graduates are well received by the society and have stable jobs. Many of the univesity's graduates now hold important positions in businesses, agencies and governments at all levels.

According to the survey, the number of graduates in 2016 is 92% in the first year after graduation.

With the distance learning method, the university has brought learning opportunities to many people across the country, from the delta to mountainous, island, deep-lying and remote areas of all economic sectors. For people with special difficulties, people with disabilities, ... contribute to the goal of building a learning society and lifelong learning.

Being aware of the importance of distance education in the education development strategy and the willingness to meet increasing aspirations in terms of quantity and quality, HOU has, on the one hand, nonstop improved, renovated the management of training, increased investment in facilities, on the other hand strengthen cooperation with the training establishments. The university has cooperated with 75 training institutions in more than 40 provinces and cities from the North to the South to open distance learning institutions. Thus, the univesity's distance learning has gained significant achievements. In the academic year 2015-2016, 20,287 people study in 7 majors. This result has gradually affirmed the prestige of the univesity in meeting the increasing requirements of society.

HOU is the pioneer in implementing the "Open Education" model to develop the scale and continuously innovate training technology to improve the quality of training.

2.2. Scientific research activities

HOU is constantly increasing and promoting scientific research activities. The university has policies to encourage, support and attract staff and lecturers to participate in scientific research activities. From 2004 to 2015, the univesity carried out five state-level projects, 38 ministerial-level subjects, 01 provincial-level project, 03 projects and 241 research institutes. In 2016, the univesity  implemented 01 state-level projects, 04 ministerial-level subjects and 23 subjects. Along with subjects in specialized fields, many research subjects at all levels of the Institute focus on distance education, investment projects, IT applications in distance learning. Research results are applied actively to distance education, deployment of training majors. The scientific research activities of the Institute are more and more broad, contents are increasingly deep in theory as well as practical in the fields of education and training, especially distance training.

In support of the student learning movement and improving the quality of training, the university organizes scientific research conferences, continuing for many years with hundreds of quality scientific papers.

2.3. International cooperation activities

HOU is very interested and focused on promoting and expanding exchanges and exchanges of experience with universities, especially open universities of countries in the region and in the world. HOU is a member of the Association of Asian Open University (AAOU) and is represented on SEAMOLEC Board of Directors. With the trust of the Association of Asian Open University, the univesity hosted and organized the 24th annual conference in Vietnam in October 2010 and continues to be trusted to host the AAOU in 2018.

HOU has cooperated with other universities and distance education centers in the region to successfully organize many training courses on distance learning such as the International Conference on "Scientific Research in open universities "(continuous from 2007 to present), training courses on" Innovating teaching methods ", topic" Applying technology in distance learning "," Building curricula, distance learning materials, etc.

Since 2000, the univesity has implemented four international programs of collegiate training with the Boxhill Institute of Technology (Australia), the Russian National University of Technology (Mati) and several universities of the Central Korea, Taiwan, Korea, Israel. Currently, the university has the following programs: Graduate training with the University of Segi-Malaysia, Victoria- Australia; Bachelor degree in finance with Chongqing University of Technology; College of Internet Security Training with Boxhill Institute of Technology; Short-term internship programs: Chinese with Guangxi University, Yunnan, Biotechnology with AICAT Center, Israeli.