In his opening remarks, HUFO President Huynh Minh Thien stressed that the history of Vietnam-US relations has demonstrated the significant and practical role played by education in the ties between the two countries.
The Vietnam-US Association (VUA) has been effectively performing its role as a useful connecting bridge of a people-to-people diplomatic organisation, in order to encourage and promote the fine values of the US and Vietnamese educational models, he said.
For her part, Mary Tarnowa, US Consul General in HCM City, recognised and spoke highly of the HCM City-branch of VUA’s efforts to accelerate the cultural and educational links between the two nations, thus creating more opportunities for Vietnamese students.
The US is proud to be a partner of Vietnam in the process of educational development and improvement, Tarnowa said, affirming that education is one of the major fields prioritised by the US delegation in Vietnam in their efforts to support the projects that improve educational opportunities for Vietnamese teenagers, aiming to prepare them for a highly competitive global working environment.
According to the diplomat, educational cooperation between Vietnam and the US is moving on to the next step as the Fulbright University Vietnam (FUV) will commence its first postgraduate course in late 2017 and its first tertiary educational course in 2018.
FUV will bring international-level education to learners, with the US academic tradition, such as freedom of inquiry, critical thinking and independent study, whilst still preserving the traditional Vietnamese heritages and culture, she stated.
At the seminar, lecturers, including Prof. Vu Duc Vuong (Hoa Sen University), Dr. Tran Xuan Thao (Van Lang University), FUV President Dam Bich Thuy and Ken Liffiton, chief executive officer of the US’s Adafin company, introduced the basic concepts and pillars of the “Liberal Arts Education” model, whilst discussing the potential, and the challenges faced, in implementing the US educational model in Vietnam in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0).
Liberal Arts Education is a tertiary educational system designed to facilitate students’ independent thinking ability, thus creating a premise for students to develop their communication skills and academic studies. It refers to flexible training programmes, facilitating intersectoral subjects, providing more intensive and extensive knowledge for students compared to their majors and fostering students’ flexible skills with high adaptability to all working environments.
