RE: [Y' KIE^'N BA.N NGHE DA`I] Giu'p do*~ Vie^.t nam

[Tuan V Nguyen <t.nguyen@garvan.unsw.edu.au>]

Hi anh AiViet,

	I hope we will not get into "war" with this pedantic 
thread :)! 

	Yes, I agree with you that the institutions that I 
mentioned are not "university". But, even the word 
"university" is loosely used and understood by people 
around the world. I do not think having a humanity faculty 
is a condition for an "university". For example, in 
Australia, some years back, there were XYZ Institute of 
Technology in each state, which actually comprised of arts 
and humanity faculties, but not medical faculty. Later, for 
either political/economic or convenient purpose, the 
government decided to change their names to XYZ University, 
without changing their teaching and research activities 
whatsoever. However, those fellows who held lecturership or 
senior academic posts (in the old Institute of Technology 
system) were promoted to professorship! There you are. 

	On the other hand, Western countries such as 
Australia usually look down at universities in developing 
countries. Institution like Phu Tho in VN, which we all 
know, trains engineers at the university level, but was 
sometimes regarded as "college" in Australia. Fifteen years 
ago, when I came here, those idiosyncratic ignorant 
arrogant Australian bureaucrats just classified me as 
"college" graduate and even asked me whether I can do 
"fraction" calculations. Bastard!!! 

	I still maintain that the name-tag of "university", 
to me, does not matter much.


	Tuan Nguyen


At 04:56 PM 4/7/97 -0500, you wrote:
>
>Hi Anh Tuan,
>I have addressed this in a message.
>Those schools that you mentioned cannot be universities as they don't 
>have enough diversified disciplines to be universities. Whatsoever goo 
>they are they are not universities. Caltech does not have Art and Human 
>studies for instance.
>
>Cheers
>Aiviet

>On Mon, 7 Apr 1997, Tuan V Nguyen wrote:
>
>> Anh Tuan and friends,
>> 
>> >I greatly admire people who stick their neck out and try to
>> >etablish private "universities". It shows that the self-reliant
>> >spirit is still alive among Vietnam's intellectuals
>> >and not everyone is simply looking up to the government to do 
>> >everything for them.
>> >
>> >The word "Dda.i ho.c" is used very loosely in VN, but what
>> >does a name matter - it is what they achieve.
>> >
>> >Cheers
>> >Tuan Pham
>> 
>> 
>>         Good point! The name does not matter much. Consider 
>> for example the London School of Economics LSE, CalTech and 
>> MIT. They do not have "university" in their name-tag, 
>> yet their reputation and achievements are envied by many 
>> established universities. 
>> 
>> 	In the old days in Saigon, some private universities 
>> such as Van Hanh, Minh Duc and Hoa Hao had produced some 
>> prominent students, and in a way, helped improving skills of 
>> the workforce. 
>> 
>> 	Tuan
>> 
>> 
>> 
>> 
>
>