“Why do I risk my professional reputation to do it?” Vietnamese teachers’ motivations and identities in relation to private tutoring

Abstract

Private tutoring is a fact of life in many education systems, including Vietnam. However, limited scholarly attention has been paid to this phenomenon in Vietnam from the perspective of teachers who provide private tutoring, whilst public discourse mainly criticises them for being ‘corrupted’ and greedy. Our study responds to this research gap using a conceptual lens that focuses on teacher motivations, professionalism, and teacher identities as mediated by the neoliberalisation of education. A qualitative case study methodology was employed to examine the motivations of Vietnamese teachers who offer private tutoring and how those motivations reflect and/or challenge their broader sense of teacher identities. The findings shed light on how teacher motivations in private tutoring are largely driven by teacher–student bonds and demands for high academic performance. Also, fully acknowledging the clash between imperatives of educational equality/equity and the potential of unethical issues, teachers have their own ways to reconcile their ethics with private tutoring. Even in private tutoring lessons, they are still supposed to fulfil their duties, which shows a Vietnamese dimension of the ‘struggle for the teacher’s soul’ currently waged around the world under the pressure of neoliberalism in education.