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Equality is a noble cause, but it is rarely achieved. Local educators are finding this out as there is a huge discrepancy in Tet bonuses ahead of the Lunar New Year.

With an average monthly income of VND3 million (US$144) to VND3.5 million ($168), which is barely enough to make ends meet, many K-12 teachers have seen these extra payments as a godsend for their financial problems.

However, only a handful have earned a bonus they were happy with, while many have been given a token amount of additional pay, or even nothing at all, for the upcoming national holiday, which falls on February 10.

High school teachers in Ho Chi Minh City seem to be the luckiest, as most received VND15-30 million ($721-1,442), depending on the school and their performance during the year.

But teachers at lower level schools are much less fortunate, since many have been paid under VND1 million ($48).

Phu Nhuan District’s Chi Linh Elementary School rewarded each teacher with VND600,000 ($29) at the most, while their colleagues at Son Ca Kindergarten were paid VND700,000 ($5) as Tet bonuses.

“Everyone at my school, from the principal to security guards, got a mere VND300,000 ($14) for this Tet,” Tran Minh Thu, principal of Dien Bien Elementary School in District 10, complained.

“Rarely heard of Tet bonuses ”

Unlike their colleagues in the city, teachers in the Mekong Delta are suffering, as many have received no bonuses to celebrate Tet.

Teachers in Bac Lieu Province will not be given any Tet bonus this year, according to Nguyen Thanh Giang, vice director of the local Department of Education and Training.

That is why Mai, a teacher, said her holiday will be low-key.

“It is very likely that I will not have a big Tet celebration as earlier planned,” she said.

Huynh Trong Duc, an education official in Kien Giang Province, said that Tet bonuses are something “completely alien to local teachers.”

“I have rarely heard of such supplemental rewards during my 20 years in education,” Duc, who is the chief of a district education board, said.

His superior, Ninh Thanh Vien, vice director of the provincial Department of Education and Training, confirmed that the province “has not given Tet bonuses to teachers for years.”

Pham Quang Binh, an elementary school teacher in Soc Trang Province, said that his school also did not award bonuses this Tet.

“We have to economize on everything this year as there is no way around it,” he said.