Thu Nguyen

CURRICULUM VITAE PERSONAL Full name: Professional Title: Work address: Xuan Thu Nguyen Professor of Vietnamese Studies Major Projects Unit RMIT University 124 La Trobe Street Melbourne 3000 Tel: 9925 1055 Fax: 9925 2352 E-mail: nguyen.xuan.thu@rmit.edu.au 17 Woolcock Ave Kew East 3102 Tel: 9857 0561 Mobile: 0412 494 302 E-mail: thunguyen47@hotmail.com Home address: 1. QUALIFICATIONS 1963 BA (double degree) in Philosophy and Literature, Hue University, Vietnam B.Edu (Sec), Hue University, Vietnam M.Sc in Instructional Systems Technology, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USA EdD of Education in Administration of Higher Education, Bloomington, Indiana, USA. Dissertation topic: Organisational Structure and Governance of Public Universities in South Vietnam (Michigan Microfilm 1974 & London 1982) 1964 1972 1974 Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 1 of 1 2. RESEARCH AND SCHOLARSHIP After completion of my Bachelor of Philosophy and Literature and Bachelor of Education in 1964, I became a secondary school teacher and taught for three years at Nguyen Hue Secondary School in central Vietnam. During this period, I wrote my first book entitled Tim hieu Chung Thuy (Understanding the Philosophy of Ending-Beginning, published in 1966). I was then appointed as Deputy Director of the National Training Centre in Vung Tau (15,000 trainees) in South Vietnam responsible for research and development. In order to carry out my task, I went to rural areas of South Vietnam every two weeks to search for information and interview the concerned people. As a result, after three years working at this Centre (1967 to 1969), I published six books Nhung y tuong tren duong xay dung que huong (Thoughts on Building of Vietnam, 6 vols). The contents were focused on culture, history and the war. I also wrote forewords to a number of books, including a book written by a Vietnamese Minister on “Westmoreland’s Search and Destroy Strategy”. These seven books were later burned and destroyed by the current Vietnamese government because they considered these books to be anti-Communist. Also as a result of my research and development work at the Vung Tau National Training Centre, I was offered a key position dealing with strategy development at the Office of Prime Minister of South Vietnamese Government (1969-1971). During this period, I was invited by the U.S. State Department to visit the United States for two months. I visited many key departments dealing with strategy development. Some months after my visit to the United States, I was granted a leadership scholarship to undertake postgraduate programs at Indiana University in Bloomington, Indiana. After having obtained my degrees at Indiana University, I returned to Vietnam and was offered a senior position at the Ministry of Education of South Vietnam. I was responsible for educational research and development and worked with international agencies in South Vietnam (UNICEF, UNESCO, UNDP, USAID, ASIA FOUNDATION etc.) on over 20 research projects aimed at improving education standards at all levels all over South Vietnam. A massive wave of restructuring of the higher education system and secondary schools in South Vietnam happened during this period. I wrote Education in South Vietnam, a book published in Saigon in early 1975, which outlined the education philosophy, plans and their implementation. After the North took over the South, I was sent to many re-education camps for five years. After my release in 1980, I escaped to Thailand and in 1982 I resettled in Australia. A week after my arrival in Melbourne, I was lucky to gain employment as a Lecturer at Phillip Institute of Technology. I worked there for 10 years until this institution amalgamated with RMIT. Being a Lecturer (1982-1991) and a Senior Lecturer (1992-1994), during my years working for Phillip Institute of Technology and later RMIT, I was involved in three fields of discipline: language, culture and education. My research and scholarship activities resulted as follows: Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 2 of 2 - I published eight books (see the list of publications), notably Understanding Vietnamese Refugees in Australia (Phillip Institute of technology, 1986 (together with Des Cahill). It was reprinted six times. This book has helped many Australians (community workers, nurses, doctors, employers, police, to name a few) understand the Vietnamese refugees, a key issue during the early stage of resettlement of the Vietnamese refugees in Australia. In 1994 I had the privilege to be invited to do a national survey on language use in Australia (one top academic for each language, I was responsible for the Vietnamese language). As a result, I completed the survey and the report Unlocking Australia’s Language Potential, Profiles of Languages in Australia, Vietnamese, was published in 1995 by the Australian Government Publishing Services. This book has been widely used by many schools in Australia and had a major impact on policy for developing the Vietnamese language for use in schools and universities in Australia. - In August 1994, I resigned from RMIT as a senior lecturer to return to Vietnam to work voluntarily for Ministry of Education and Training, Vietnam National University Hanoi and, as a paid consultant, for RMIT. Although being busy with my daily work, I spent a lot of my time to pursue my research activities on higher education and culture. As a result, I published an article on culture in Van Nghe (15 March 1987), the most renowned magazine owned by the Vietnamese Association of Writers. This article ignited a twoyear debate on culture involving most scholars in Vietnam. Many top communist political members in Hanoi, and many researchers and scholars in Vietnam have read this article and it has become a standard reference for many important seminars, conferences and workshops in Vietnam. Finally, in late 1999, the Vietnamese Communist Party issued a “Regulations on Maintenance and Development of Vietnamese Culture” to set up a strategic framework for strengthening the Vietnamese culture based in large part on my research work. Also with my research pursuit in the area of language, in 1997 I published a chapter in a book published in Berlin and New York (“The Convergence of Vietnamese” in Undoing and Redoing Corpus Planning, edited by Michael Clyne, Mouton de Gruyter, (hard bound), Berlin and New York, 1997). This chapter was well received by many international readers. In 1997 also as a result of my research interest, I published an article in a professional journal in UK: “Higher Education in Vietnam: Key Areas Need Assistance” in Higher Education Policy (Vol. 10, No. 22, pp. 137-143), published by the International Association of Universities, Pergamon, Great Britain. 3. EDUCATION DEVELOPMENT AND PRACTICE During the period from 1982 to 1994, and some years later, I was involved in the following educational activities: Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 3 of 3 - Taught Vietnamese at Phillip Institute of Technology and Footscray Institute of Technology, both undergraduate and post graduate programs. The feedback was very promising. Many students enrolled in the Vietnamese classes at both Phillip Institute of Technology and Footscray Institute of Technology and the Vietnamese language and culture classes flourished in Victoria more than anywhere in Australia. Apart from teaching, I was, for a period, the course coordinator at Phillip Institute of Technology, supervised 12 Master students at Phillip Institute of Technology and three PhD students. I also examined two Master thesis (both at Tasmanian University at Launceston) and two PhD dissertations (National University of Singapore, Curtin University). Development of Vietnamese language and culture programs for Phillip Institute of Technology and Footscray Institute of Technology. The background of this program is that from 1982 to 1984, the Commonwealth Department of Education provided funding to develop community languages and cultures in four states in Australia. Four states received this community language and culture funding were: ACT (ANU), NSW (Western Sydney Institute of Advanced Education), Victoria (Phillip Institute of Technology and Footscray Institute of Technology), and WA (Mount Lawley College of Advanced Education). As a result of my involvement in curriculum development, after the funding was ended in 1984, both Phillip Institute of Technology and Footscray Institute of Technology offered their own Bachelors degrees with a major in Vietnamese language and culture whilst other states, which received the similar funding, could not commence their own program until five or six years later. Development of Vietnamese Syllabus Group 1 for Years 11 and 12 for Victorian Schools. I was the person who initiated this project and wrote the first drafts of the syllabus. Later many Vietnamese teachers joined me and formed a Vietnamese Steering Committee to work with the Victorian Department of Education. As this Group One Vietnamese program was very new and very competitive, the Vietnamese Steering Committee had to work very hard to gain the status of Group One (recognised to gain entrance to university, not every language could be offered the Group One status). Today the Victorian School of Languages has been offering Vietnamese in eight centres throughout Victoria and the Vietnamese language has become one of the three community languages selected by VCE students. Students study Vietnamese to help them to maintain their mother tongue, their culture and identity and also earn good marks at the end of year 12. In term of professional activities, I was Chairman of the Committee for the Preparation of Vietnamese Teaching Materials (1983-1990) to supervise the preparation and publication of 17 bilingual books (Vietnamese and English) funded by the Commonwealth Department of Education. I was elected as President of the Vietnamese Teachers Association of Victoria (1989-1991) and members of various Course Advisory Committees: Interpreting and translation at Victoria College (19881990) and Language program at Swinburne Institute of Technology (1990-1991). I was also a member of the National Committee on Vietnamese Language and Studies - - - Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 4 of 4 (1992-1993) and a member of the National Committee on the Vietnamese Teaching Profile in the Extension of the Nine Key Languages Taught in Australia (1993-1994). I think the above achievements could not have been obtained if I had not had the good professional skills and a willingness to be committed well beyond the call of duty in the interest of students. I was the key organiser of many workshops on education and Vietnamese language, international conferences (on Indochinese Health opened by Federal Minister N. Bluett and on Indochinese Youth by Federal Minister G. Hand) and a book launch with the keynote speaker the Federal Opposition Leader Dr John Hewson. As a result, Australia and Indochinese Health Issues (edited by Nguyen Xuan Thu, with others), conference proceedings, were published in 1991 by Phillip Institute of Technology. While working in Vietnam, in 1996, I was also the key organiser of the International Conference on Higher Education in the 21st Century. This was a conference jointly organised by RMIT and VNU Hanoi. However, VNU Hanoi played a silent partner and I was the lead organiser. Over 200 participants attended this conference, half of them came from overseas. Even more significant was the International conference in 1998 on Vietnamese Studies, jointly organised by VNU Hanoi, National Centre for Social Science and Humanities (Director holds the title of a Minister) and RMIT. I was the person who worked day and night to make this conference successful. This was the largest international conference ever held to date in Vietnam. Over 700 participants attended this conference, half of them came from overseas. Party leader Le Kha Phieu, President of Vietnam Tran Duc Luong, Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, Retired General Vo Nguyen Giap (who defeated the French troops at Dien Bien Phu Battle in 1954) either opened or attended the conference. Professor David Beanland of RMIT gave presentations at both international conferences. This conference was mainly funded by the Ford Foundation (USD 200,000) and sponsored by the Toyota Foundation in Tokyo (USD 30,000). I was the editor of the Vietnamese Studies, the International Conference on Vietnamese Studies Proceedings (Hanoi, 1998), which presented the conference considerations. From 1994 to 1997, after resigning from RMIT as a senior lecturer to return to Vietnam, I worked on a voluntary basis for Ministry of Education and Training (MOET). My role was to assist the Department of Higher Education in its restructuring of the higher education system in Vietnam and to provide professional advice to Minister Tran Hong Quan on various key issues in relation to improving higher education in Vietnam. I was also advisor to Professor Nguyen Van Dao, President of Vietnam National University Hanoi. VNU Hanoi is the most prestigious university in Vietnam. During the years I worked in Vietnam, the professional relationship between RMIT and VNU Hanoi flourished remarkably. Today VNU Hanoi and RMIT are not only academic partners but also are close friends. I have been acknowledged by two world renowned writers. Mr Nguyen Hung Quoc, a world-renowned critic, in his recent book Vietnamese Literature Viewed from the Angle of Post-Modernisation (Van Nghe, CA, 2000) expressed his great appreciation - - - Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 5 of 5 for the impact of my inspiration on his thinking. Mr Vo Phien, a veteran writer, has also expressed the same feeling. All these activities have been valued by international and Vietnamese educational leaders, educators and overseas Vietnamese as part of educational practice and a contribution from RMIT to the best interest of the Vietnamese communities either in Vietnam or outside Vietnam. 4. INSTITUTIONAL, PROFESSIONAL AND COMMUNITY LEADERSHIP 1. With leadership in community activities, I was involved in the following community activities: • • Founder and President of the Australian Association of Vietnamese Studies (19871995) Founder and President of the Vietnam Scholarship Foundation (1991-1995) As President of the Australian Association of Vietnamese Studies, I worked closely with Austcare, Australian non-profit organisations and international institutions in Hanoi, including the Australian Embassy in Hanoi, (i) to establish two training centres (Hue Vocational Training Centre for Young Women, and Quang Tri Vocational and Technical Training Centre), (ii) to build in Vinh Linh a primary school and a health consultation centre, and (iii) to offer nearly 500 small scholarships to the neediest students studying in universities in Vietnam (nearly 100 scholarships each year), many of them later obtained AusAID scholarship and studied at RMIT. From 1996, I have been working with Emeritus Professor Leo Foster of Rotary Club International (Coburg) to fund an experimental program for coffee planting initiated by the Tay Nguyen University Centre for Practical Experiment (1996-1998), and the Australian Embassy in Hanoi (DAP Program) to provide funds to establish a primary school for the Ede people in the Chue hamlet in Buon Ma Thuot of Dak Lak province. I have also been working with Professor Leo Foster to help street kids in Binh Thanh District of Ho Chi Minh City. My role has been to provide initiatives, draft programs and strategies, and coordinate activities. 2. With regard to leadership in significant teaching and learning and consulting projects, I have had the following activities: • With a grant from the Commonwealth government in 1993, I developed a series of 17 bilingual textbooks (Vietnamese and English) and these books have been used widely in Australia, the United States, English, Canada and many other parts in the world. This is a unique set of bilingual textbooks available in the world. It has contributed to teaching and learning of Vietnamese language and culture. Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 6 of 6 • As a result of a Commonwealth grant in 1991, I went to the United States and France to carry out my research. In the end, the Indochinese program, the first ever initiated and taught in Australia, was developed and later become a major component in the Bachelor of Art in Intercultural Studies at Phillip Institute of Technology. In pursuing research on language, apart from development of teaching material, I was commissioned by Lonely Planet to write a Vietnamese Phrasebook (Lonely Planet Publications, 1993). This book was reprinted many times. Many hundred thousand foreign tourists have used this small book. In 1998, I was commissioned by the Australian Embassy in Hanoi (Australian Education International) to write a guidebook on Doing Education Business in Vietnam. This document has helped many Australian Education Providers to understand educational systems in Vietnam as well as the business culture of the Vietnamese people. The funds provided by The Ford Foundation (USD 200,000) and The Toyota Foundation of Tokyo (USD 30,000) for the International Conference on Vietnamese Studies in Hanoi in 1998 were granted in part on the ground of my leadership recognised internationally and they have also marked an international recognition of my consulting and community activities. • • • 3. My role as founder and editor-in-chief of the Journal of Vietnamese Studies (19871995) has also marked one of my contributions to professional leadership. With nearly 10 years of leadership and contribution, the Journal of Vietnamese Studies has produced many good research articles for the public and students’ use, in Australia, the United States, France, U.K, and elsewhere. This Journal together with my book Vietnamese Studies in a Multicultural Society (Vietnamese Language & Culture Publications, Melbourne, 1994) has contributed greatly to the understanding of Vietnamese culture, history and people as this is the only journal in English available outside Vietnam. Many undergraduate and postgraduate students in Australia and overseas, including medical students, have used this Journal as a useful source of references for their study. 4. Combination of my institutional, professional and community leadership From 1994 to 1998, apart from assisting MOET and VNU Hanoi, I have also passed on my experience of administration and management of higher education to many other universities throughout Vietnam. During those early years of restructuring of higher education system in Vietnam, I had the opportunity to express my own long years experience with many educators and educational leaders in Vietnam, through workshops, seminars and conferences, and also via private meetings with senior leaders at MOET and at many universities, including Minister Tran Hong Quan, Vice Minister Tran Chi Dao. I also wrote long reports on higher education and my experience with Western education Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 7 of 7 including my experience when I worked for the Saigon Government to help them to understand how a multidisciplinary university works. The universities I had the opportunity to pass on my experience were Vietnam National University Hanoi (Professor Nguyen Van Dao, President), Hanoi University of Foreign Languages (Professor Ta Tien Hung, Rector), Hanoi University of Technology (Professor Hoang Trong Yem then Professor Hoang Van Phong, rector), University of Hue (Professor Nguyen The Huu, President, then currently Professor Nguyen Vien Tho), Ho Chi Minh City University (Professor Nguyen Ngoc Giao, Rector and later Vice President of Vietnam National University of HCMC), and HCMC University of Technology (Professor Truong Minh Ve, Rector and later Vice President). My professional experience in administration and management of higher education has played a vital role in establishing the relationship between RMIT and various universities in Vietnam. These activities would certainly contribute to and enhance RMIT goals and objectives in transforming RMIT as an institution of higher education serving internationally. From 1996 to date, I have worked closely with many Departments within MOET, various Departments within the Ministry of Planning and Investment, Ministry of Finance, General Department of Land Administration in Hanoi, Ho Chi Minh City People’s Committee, Management Authority for Saigon South Development to seek an Investment Licence for RMIT to establish and operate an International University in Ho Chi Minh City. The granting of the Investment Licence to RMIT by the Vietnamese government on 20 April 2000 to establish and operate an international university in Vietnam is an outstanding achievement of my initiative and the hard work of many people at RMIT. The RMIT International University Vietnam is the first foreign university established in Vietnam. It is a major project between the two countries. It is a bridge culturally and commercially binding the two countries together. It is a project of international significance. In short, with the above activities, not every academic or scholar of today can reach these achievements. These achievements are a combination of many top skills: it is a product of research and scholarship recognised internationally; it marks a highly achieved educational development and practice; and especially it is also an official recognition for my institutional, professional and community leadership. 5. Publications Books: Vietnamese Studies, Conference Proceedings (ed.), Vietnam National University Hanoi, Hanoi, 1998. Higher Education in the 21st Century, Conference Proceedings (ed.), Vietnam National University Hanoi, Hanoi, 1996 Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 8 of 8 Unlocking Australia's Language Potential, Profiles of Languages in Australia, Vietnamese, published by National Language and Literacy Institute of Australia, Australian Government Publishing Services, Canberra, 1995. Vietnamese Studies in a Multicultural World (ed.), Vietnamese Language & Culture Publications, Melbourne, 8/1994. Vietnamese Phrasebook, Lonely Planet Publications, Melbourne, 1993 (reprint seven times). Language, Education and Culture, a Vietnamese Perspective, Phillip Institute of Technology, Melbourne, 1991. Australia and Indochinese Health Issues (eds., with others), Australian Association of Vietnamese Studies, Melbourne, 1990. Selected Vietnamese Folktales, Phillip Institute of Technology Press, Melbourne, 1987. Life with Past Images (ed.), Phillip Institute of Technology Press, Melbourne, 1986. Understanding Vietnamese Refugees in Australia (with Des Cahill), Phillip Institute of Technology Press, Melbourne, 1986 (reprint six times). Education in South Vietnam, Ministry of Education Press, Saigon, 1975. Organisational Structure and Governance of Public Universities in South Vietnam, Michigan Microfilm 1974 & London 1982 (my EdD dissertation). Nhung y tuong tren duong xay dung que huong (Thoughts on the Building of a Free Vietnam), Vol. 5 & 6, 1969, (under the name Tuong Van Nguyen Be) Tuong Van Publishers, Saigon. Nhung y tuong tren duong xay dung que huong (Thoughts on the Building of a Free Vietnam), Vol. 3 & 4, 1968, (under the name Tuong Van Nguyen Be) Tuong Van Publishers, Saigon. Nhung y tuong tren duong xay dung que huong (Thoughts on the Building of a Free Vietnam), Vol. 1 & 2, 1967, (under the name Tuong Van Nguyen Be) Tuong Van Publishers, Saigon. Tim hieu Chung Thuy (Understanding the Philosophy of Ending-Beginning), 1996, (under the name Tuong Van Nguyen Be) Tuong Van Publishers, Saigon. Chapter in a book: Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 9 of 9 “The Reconvergence of Vietnamese” in Undoing and Redoing Corpus Planning, edited by Michael Clyne, Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin and New York, 1997. Articles in professional journals (to name a few): • • “Tam su voi mot nguoi ban cu” (Talk with an Old Friend), under my pen name Nguyen Phuong Linh, Van Hoc,no. 184, August 2001, pp. 69-74, California. “Higher Education in Vietnam: Key Areas Need Assistance” in Higher Education Policy, Vol. 10, No. 22, pp. 137-143, 1997, published by the International Association of Universities, Pergamon, Great Britain. “Mot vai suy nghi ve van hoa” (Some Thoughts on Culture) in Van Nghe (Literature and the Art), No. 11, 15/03/1997, Hanoi, published by the Vietnamese Writers Association). This article has been well received by many polite bureau members, politicians, scholars, researchers and created a constructive debate on understanding of culture and formulating cultural strategies all over Vietnam from March 1997 to December 1999. “Ban them ve van hoa” (A Closer Understanding of Culture) also in Van Nghe (Literature and the Art), No. 45, 8/11/1997, Hanoi. This article and the March article have been key papers for use by many cultural policy makers and researchers in Vietnam. “Indochinese Studies in the United States”, The Ky 21 (the 21st Century Magazine), Issues no. 1983 and 1984, November 1990, California, USA. This is the research report on the Indochinese studies in the United States as part of the program funded by the Commonwealth Department of Education in 1990. “Viet hoc tai Uc” (Vietnamese Studies in Australia) in The Ky 21 (the 21st Century Magazine), Issue no. 1713, June 1989, California, USA. This is my keynote paper delivered at the Conference on Education and Advancement of Indochinese Education in Portland, Washington, in 1989. • • • • Editor: • • • Nuoc ta [My Country], Monthly magazine (in Vietnamese), Saigon, Issues from July 1967 to October 1969. Journal of Vietnamese Studies, 1987-1995, Melbourne. Vietnamese Studies Review, 1997-1998, Melbourne. Xuan Thu Nguyen Page 10 of 10