Busy with studying, internship, and preparing her end-of-course graduation project, Hoang Thi Duyen nevertheless continues exuding fresh energy. The reason is that she is about to enter a new phase full of expectation in her professional life after the years she has been studying the Advanced program of CSU-standard Architecture at DTU with lots of fun.
Won’t forget a festival day of many beautiful memories
2020 was the 12th time the National Festival for Architecture Students was held in Danang. A dynamic member of her class, Duyen was selected by her lecturers to join the DTU team for the contest.
“It’s really fun,” Hoang Thi Duyen says. “The DTU team for the contest counted 41 students and 9 lecturers, and we got 12 prizes in six contest sections. I made a huge many new friends thanks to the contest. This will help me a huge lot in my studies or work later on. The Architecture Festival is organized tremendously meticulously and brings students from all over the country to many places around Danang to explore a lot of new things, teaching us all a good deal of useful things.”
Hoang Thi Duyen, student of the Advanced and High-Quality program in Architecture
At the Festival, Duyen and her friends competed in the Parametric Shaping section. Using a huge lot of everyday objects, formex, mica, polystyrene pellets, balls, etc, and applying their skills to create shapes using 4.0 technology (computers, CNC…), Duyen and her friends created continuous sea waves symbolizing the human psyche. The work carries an important message for young people: “Let our minds’ contents flow out to the sea, back into the deep ocean of our psyche, to feel the vastness of our souls and let all our afflictions sink into the depths of the ocean.”
But what left her most touched during her participation in the Architecture Festival was when Duyen and her friends competed in the Quick Design A section on the topic “A friendly space at the river”. The design by Duyen and her friend stemmed from their observation of the young city of Danang. The city currently contains little vegetation while its citizens like going for walks. Duyen and her teammates therefore had the idea to design a “Multi-Story Greenery Park” on the Han River bank. Arranging many layers of greenery interweaving at different heights and gradually spreading to the river, the team wishes to communicate the desire of the people of Danang for the city to have a larger area of greenery, which would bring fresh air and coolness and further improve living quality. The community-oriented design idea fired up Duyen and her friends’ enthusiasm as they could plant a huge number of trees on their project drawing.
High prizes encouraging passion for studiesThe 2020 National Festival for Architecture Students yielded Duyen many big prizes:
? “Well-Rounded” prize: main category,
? Quick Design A first prize on the topic “A friendly space at the river”,
? Parametric Shaping third prize one the topic “Waves”
Furthermore, Duyen and her friends had already participated previously and won:
? a consolation prize at the 4th “Sand Sculpture on the Beach” contest in 2019.
Hoang Thi Duyen (third from left in row standing up) with her friends
“My participation in the contest taught me a lot of additional knowledge in architecture, which is the field I’m pursuing,” Duyen explains, “and helped me more clearly determine my goals for the future. I’m currently working for the company DesignForCommunity as a draftsperson. The job helps me a lot to put my theoretical knowledge to practical use.”
Third prize in Parametric Shaping (top) and first prize in Quick Design A on the topic “A friendly space at the river”
On her choice of DTU’s Advanced and High-Quality program of CSU-standard Architecture, Duyen says, “I weighed all the pros and cons when I chose DTU. But after four school years, I now know I made the right choice for my personal development. From infrastructure to lecturing quality, it all leaves me satisfied. The lecturers are dedicated and the professional exchange meetings encourage me to continue my efforts. CSU-standard Architecture is a program from collaboration of DTU with California State University and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, ranked fifth in training in architecture in the US, and when I’ll graduate, I’ll obtain from 19 to 24 course credits from California State University. That’ll be a great advantage to confidently find a job I like.”
For Duyen, Architecture is an interesting major. General knowledge of culture, people, and life in society has a very strong impact on how architects design their works. Duyen’s wish for the future is therefore to be able to visit many places, expand her worldview, and learn even more knowledge to be able to design beautiful works for the community.
In the 2022 enrollment season, DTU offers a 30% reduction of tuition fees for the entire course for successful applicants to architecture minors.
(Media Center)