The Sterling Group’s fifth mission to Vietnam to promote the engineering excellence of UK universities was successfully accomplished. Let us put this down in numbers: 3,000 students in Vietnam’s three biggest cities (Hanoi, Danang and Ho Chi Minh City) attending 52 lectures, 16 meetings with leaders and managements of local engineering universities, two public talks that attracted hundreds of interested participants.
The Sterling Group consists of top research-led UK universities which share a commitment to international excellence in Engineering research and teaching. Joining the 2012 Vietnam tour were ten professors from the universities of Aston, Cambridge, Durham, Edinburgh, Leeds, Loughborough, Newcastle, Oxford, and Southampton.
For the first time a workshop on renewable energy and advanced surveillance system had been organised during the tour, tapping to the fullest the academic resource of the Sterling professors. This idea which was initiated by the British Council Vietnam in coordination with Danang University of Technology was considered ‘very innovative’ by many UK professors as the workshop attracted ministry-level representatives including the Ministry of Education and Training, Ministry of Commerce and Industry and local businesses.
Meetings and networking activities organised by the British Council Vietnam were also considered ‘highly productive.’ Meeting with local policy makers, institutional leaders, academics, researchers, the UK academics discussed the possibilities of sending high-quality Vietnamese candidates for doctoral studies in the UK, collaborating in the provision of joint research degrees and conducting joint research. This is very much relevant to the internationalisation strategy of the UK universities.
Last but not least, the interest of local audiences and media was created through the umbrella theme of Engineering the Future, especially the topic of a public lecture delivered by the Oxford’s Head of Engineering Guy Houlsby. The lecture was about understanding the ground movements around excavations in cities, which specially generated interest among local media as the country’s two biggest cities (Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City) are planning to start building their underground systems. Two major televisions in town (Hanoi and VTC TV) came to interview Guy Houlsby. At the same time, Alison Halstead, Pro-Vice Chancellor of Aston University and Steve Bull from Newcastle University got featured on different high-profile programmes of VTC10, a television channel carried by all cable networks in Vietnam. Alison and Steve took the chance to talk about the UK engineering excellence and opportunities for Vietnamese applicants to study engineering in the UK.
Apart from this, the news about the Sterling Group’s activities got picked up by 11 local popular online and print newspapers including the most popular pages (Vietnamnet, VNExpress, Dan Tri) targeting students and young professionals.