Around 22 million school and college students began a new school year on Wednesday with colorful opening ceremonies held around the country.

The 2012-13 academic year welcomes over 4 million kindergarteners, 15 million school students, 600,000 vocational school enrollees, 800,000 junior college students, and 1.4 million undergraduates, according to the Ministry of Education and Training (MoET).

MoET says it will adopt many reforms in this school year and make it a stepping stone for more comprehensive changes in the future.

It aims to universalize preschool education for 5-year-olds, improve quality at K-12 and undergraduate levels, and accelerate the education of ethics, personality, and life skills for students throughout the academic year.

English will continue being taught to 3rd-, 4th-, and 5th-graders under national pilot programs, the ministry says.

The education governing body has also requested pedagogical schools to speed up their reform efforts to churn out a higher-quality generation of teachers for the country in the new school year.

Following are pictures of the new school year opening ceremonies at schools in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi, and Kien Giang Province.

Ho Chi Minh City Party Secretary Le Thanh Hai shakes hands with a schoolgirl at Nguyen Thuong Hien High School located in the city’s Tan Binh District during a new school year opening ceremony on Wednesday morning.  

Nguyen Thuong Hien students donate money to build a school in Truong Sa Islands at this morning’s ceremony.

Le Kha Phieu, former General Secretary of the Communist Party of Vietnam, beats the drum as a symbolic formality to open the new school year at Trung Vuong Middle School in Hoan Kiem District, Hanoi.

Professor Ngo Bao Chau, who won the Fields Medal in 2010, is heartily welcome by Trung Vuong students and teachers.

Students receive scholarships jointly presented at the new school year opening ceremony today by Tuoi Tre newspaper and alumni of Nguyen Trung Truc High School in the southern province of Kien Giang.