Professor Ngo Bao Chau, Director of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Mathematics, has been appointed by the Minister of Education and Training, Phung Xuan Nha, to lead the Ministerial Consulting Group for Higher Education, to recommend improvements that could be made to the Vietnamese education system. Professor Chau has a comprehensive understanding of both national and international education and has published papers on the topic. He visited DTU on April 4th to learn about the successful model that has evolved there over the past 22 years. Professor Chau is the winner of the Fields Medal, the highest prize in mathematics in the world, and, with Professor Nguyen Huu Du, Executive-Director of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Mathematics, exchanged ideas and answered questions from DTU lecturers and students.
Professor Chau meets with the DTU Board, lecturers and students
DTU Vice-Provost, Vo Thanh Hai, gave an overview on the development and achievements of DTU lecturers and students. Professor Chau was interested in the issues of university autonomy, international relations and DTU research activities. Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co, DTU President and Provost, was very open on many of the issues that were of concern to Professor Chau.
Distinguished Teacher Le Cong Co said: “Since our inception, the DTU strategy and evolution have been quite different from other universities. While other universities are still grappling with modernization, DTU began collaborating with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in 2008 to share its Information Technology curriculum. CMU is one of the four leading universities in Information Technology in the US, so signing an agreement with them was not easy at that time. However, with its determination to partner with well-known international universities, DTU succeeded with CMU and opened up further opportunities with two other universities. Pennsylvania State University (PSU) and California State University Fullerton and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo (CSU) offered us international programs in Business Administration and Hospitality and in Architecture, and Construction respectively.
University autonomy is a novelty at public universities but not at private ones like DTU, where it is well-established. This has enabled DTU to strategize independently, despite prevailing problems in enrolment and the ever-changing national educational environment. DTU has therefore remained stable in Vietnamese education, with the ability to rapidly resolve most issues. As a result, education at DTU has improved steadily and policies have been implemented to attract high-quality lecturers returning from universities in developed countries. This strategy has also allowed DTU to develop its research activities, with 486 international papers published in ISI and Scopus-listed journals so far.
Furthermore, we have implemented twenty Nafosted projects, together with other research funded from abroad, national and local government or communities. DTU’s wish right now, in common with other private universities, is equality in funding, enrolment and staff. This will create even stronger universities, without a public and private divide, with more power to develop, broaden educational opportunities and come up with even better research results.”
By 2020, DTU aims to obtain international accreditation for a number of its majors, from such authorities as the American ABET, ACPHA and ACBSP groups. By 2022, DTU wants to be ranked among the top 300 Asian universities, published annually by Time Higher Education. Professor Chau noted this with interest and added that universities should have broad vision and great determination to establish a strong foundation for future development.
Professor Chau signs autographs and DTU lecturers and students ask questions at the meeting
During the afternoon, Professor Chau fielded questions from DTU lecturers and students about their studies, careers and job titles.
In answer to a question from Dr. Nguyen The Duong, Dean of the DTU Faculty of Construction, about the definition of the title of Professor, Professor Chau explained that the meaning of the word is very different in Vietnam compared to the rest of the world. Professorships are awarded in Vietnam to honor academics but, in other countries, the position comes with many more responsibilities.
When a department has a vacancy for a Professor, it immediately needs to hire a replacement. The Dean will contact his peers and ask them for an assessment of each of the candidates. The Rector will then select and approve the best one. Professors in other countries are experts in their fields but are also responsible for promoting the education and research of their department for the overall benefit of their university. In Vietnam, Professors should no longer be appointed based only on how many research papers and books they have published. Attention should be paid instead to judging how well they will contribute to the advancement of research and the counseling of PhD students.
Students who believe that they won’t need their high-school knowledge when studying at university, because it won’t be useful in their jobs later, are misinformed. However, with the rapid developments and changes in our lives today, our current education system may never keep up with future work requirements. We should therefore study broadly to prepare for all these changes and quickly adapt to anything unexpected that might happen tomorrow.
Professor Chau is always interested in questions relating to student career orientation. Many parents and students nowadays decide on a career path based on emotions or fashionable job potential, without honestly knowing what they really want to do. As a result, they become bored at university. This is why the government and universities should establish groups that offer career counseling and orientation, to help students to learn more about specific careers, before selecting a suitable major. At the same time, universities should upgrade their teaching staff and curricula, to become much more competitive internationally as the country becomes increasingly integrated.
Prof. Nguyen Huu Du, Executive Director of the Institute for Advanced Study in Mathematics, explained that Mathematics is very highly respected in Vietnam, especially since Prof. Chau won the Fields Medal. In Southeast Asia, Vietnam ranks first in Mathematics, having overtaken Singapore. In the whole of Asia it is on a par with South Korea. It is also the only discipline in Vietnam that meets international expectations.
These initial achievements will encourage education in Vietnam to renovate comprehensively, to start a new era and to advance and develop ever more.
(Media Center)