School Search · Vietnam

School search in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City: the child first, the shortlist second

This is the one part of an arrival whose calendar belongs to somebody else. Asia Relocation Vietnam reads the child file in-house, checks intake and year groups school by school, and visits with you — before the district is chosen, not after.

Ask for a school search quotation → What we check
Running in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi No ranking, a fit Consultants who visit with you
2cities where the search runs: Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi
4programme families compared, national systems included
3things checked per school: intake, year group, requirements
1shortlist, built against the child rather than a ranking

Everything else about an arrival in Vietnam can be rescheduled. A year group cannot. Admission dates, available places and entry requirements belong to each establishment, differ from one to the next, and are indifferent to when your contract starts.

Which is why the order matters so much here. Families who settle the housing first and approach schools afterwards discover that the address they chose is on the wrong side of the run, or that the place they wanted closed a term ago. Reversed, the same decision is simply easier.

Asia Relocation Vietnam shortlists against your child rather than against a league table: the academic record, the language level, the year group, and the commute you will genuinely be doing. Our consultants live in these cities, and they visit the schools with you.

The perimeter

What a Vietnamese school search actually checks, and what it cannot promise

The right-hand column is the half that keeps a family from being disappointed in March.

What the search carries

  • The child read before the school. Academic record, language level, the year group applied for, and what did not work last time.
  • A shortlist, with our reasoning attached. Built against your brief, not copied from a list of reputable names.
  • Three checks per establishment. Intake dates, year-group availability and admission requirements, confirmed rather than assumed.
  • Visits in Hanoi or Ho Chi Minh City. With the school run driven at the hour you would really be driving it.
  • The application file, and the follow-through. Documents assembled, sent, chased, and an honest reading of each answer.

Scope agreed in writing before the first school is approached.

What this page does not do

  • Admit your child. Vietnamese international schools decide their own intakes; we prepare the case, we do not sit on the board.
  • Publish tuition. Each school sets and publishes its own fees, and repeating them second-hand would date within a term.
  • Find the home. Once a place is confirmed, the address follows it — that is home search.
  • House you meanwhile. A family arriving before term starts needs temporary housing.
  • Explain the rest of the city. Clinics, transport and registrations sit with city orientation.

Say in the inquiry which of these should run on the same file.

Programmes

Four routes through a Vietnamese school year, and the question each answers

The programme is chosen for where the child goes next, not for where the family is now.

The International Baccalaureate route

Built for children who will move again, and the reason many mobile families choose it: the programme travels even when the country does not. Available in both Vietnamese cities we cover.

Moves again

The British curriculum

The natural continuation for a child already inside it, and a common choice for households whose next posting is likelier to be a Commonwealth country than a Vietnamese one.

UK-bound

The American curriculum

Chosen where the university plan points that way, or where a child transfers in from a US school and a change of system would cost a year that nobody wanted to spend.

US-bound

National-system and bilingual schools

French, Japanese and Singaporean national-system establishments are within reach in Hanoi, alongside bilingual schools. This is the route that keeps a child inside their home system while abroad.

Hanoi shelf
The child file

Five steps, and none of them starts with a school

  1. The child, in detail

    Record, languages spoken at home and at school, the year group applied for, support needs, and what went badly at the last transfer. This is the document everything else is built on.

  2. Which Vietnamese city, and why

    Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City do not offer the same shelf of schools. If the posting allows a choice, the schooling is a legitimate reason to make it here rather than later.

  3. The shortlist, checked school by school

    Intake dates, year-group availability and admission requirements confirmed for your child specifically. A general rule about Vietnamese admissions would be wrong for half the list.

  4. Visits, and the run at the real hour

    You meet the schools and we drive the commute when it would actually be driven. A shortlist that looked equal on paper rarely survives that morning intact.

  5. Applications, and the answers

    Documents assembled and sent, each school chased on its own timetable, and a straight reading of what comes back — including when a second choice has become the realistic one.

Families we see

Four families arriving in Vietnam, and what each is really deciding

Families letting the school pick the district

They have understood the order, and they are right. Once a place is confirmed in Ho Chi Minh City or Hanoi, the housing brief practically writes itself.

Families arriving outside the intake

A contract that starts mid-year does not move a school calendar. Here the work is establishment by establishment, because availability in a given year group is not a national fact.

Families staying inside a home system

A child due to re-enter a French, Japanese or Singaporean curriculum later. Hanoi holds that shelf, and it is one of the clearest reasons to prefer the capital.

Mobility teams whose assignee is waiting

An acceptance that will not be signed until the children have places. We report where each application stands, so nobody is briefing a board on a rumour.

Two shortlists

Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City do not hand a family the same list

The city is not a detail of the schooling decision. In Vietnam it is part of it.

Both cities carry International Baccalaureate, British and American programmes, and bilingual schools alongside them. Hanoi adds something the south does not: French, Japanese and Singaporean national-system establishments within reach, which for some households settles the question of where to be posted.

In Ho Chi Minh City the deciding variable is more often the run itself — a place that looks ideal can sit an hour from the district a family would otherwise choose. School search runs in these two cities. Da Nang is covered by other destination services and not by this one, which we would rather say now than after a shortlist has been started.

FAQ

What parents ask before a school file is opened in Vietnam

How early should the school search start?
Earlier than the housing, and that is the part most families reverse. A school decides the district far more often than a district decides the school, so we would rather open the child file first and let the address follow it.
Do you rank the schools for us?
No. A ranking is one outside view of an institution, and it tells you nothing about whether your child will be taught well in it. We shortlist against the record, the language level and the year group, then give you our reasoning so you can argue with it.
Is the shortlist the same in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City?
No, and this is the fact that surprises families most. Alongside the International Baccalaureate, British and American curricula, Hanoi also puts French, Japanese and Singaporean national-system schools within reach. A household moving south does not have that shelf to choose from.
Can you guarantee a place?
Nobody can, and an agency that says otherwise is selling you something. What we do is check intake dates, year-group availability and admission requirements school by school, prepare the file properly, and tell you early when a shortlist is too narrow to be safe.
We arrive in the middle of the school year. Is that hopeless?
Not hopeless, but it narrows the list, and by how much depends on the school rather than on Vietnam. Year-group availability differs from one establishment to the next, so we check yours instead of quoting a general rule that would be wrong for half of them.
What do the schools charge?
Each school sets and publishes its own fees, and they are the school figures rather than ours, so we do not repeat them here. We tell you which of your shortlist publishes what, and where a cost sits outside the tuition line, before you visit.
Should we choose the district first?
Only if you want to do it twice. In Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi alike, the daily run to the school gate is the thing a family actually lives with, and it is easier to choose an address around a confirmed place than to move a child around an address.
Do you visit the schools with us?
Yes, and we drive the run at the hour you would really be doing it, not at eleven in the morning when the roads are kind. Asia Relocation Vietnam consultants live in these cities, and a visit is where a shortlist stops being theoretical.
Not what you were looking for?

Once the place is confirmed, the rest of the city starts

Everything beyond the school gate

Neighbourhoods, clinics, transport and the registrations of the third week, in Ho Chi Minh City, Hanoi and Da Nang.

City orientation →

The order an arrival belongs in

What Asia Relocation Vietnam runs on the destination side, and which service reaches which Vietnamese city.

Relocation in Vietnam →

Tell us the children, the term, and the city if it is decided

A consultant opens the child file, checks the Vietnamese shortlist school by school, and comes back with reasoning you can disagree with.

Ask for a school search quotation →
School search quote What we check
Volume calculator