Projects List
Projects
Below are the completed projects from our HEEAP University and Vocational programs. Click on the title to view the description, click on more to view the entire project.
University Projects
Cohort Year: 2010
Based on surveys of current engineering education methodology, courses from DUT, and corporations, the project members recognize that persuading DUT engineering faculty to be aware of the urgency of renovating the current education methodology may be difficult. The primary reason for this being that the instructional methodology of DUT faculty has been mostly rooted in teacher-centered approaches used in Vietnam. Therefore, in order to accomplish IMIP goals, the project members will help EETM faculty adopt the student-centered approach in their classrooms and course syllabi. More specifically, the detailed implementation of IMIP is planned as follows:
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The project approach is to improve the learning outcomes of engineering courses in both electrical and mechanical undergraduate engineering programs. Eventually, there will be many courses in the two programs meeting ABET standards once long-term advancement of the programs through improvements in instruction, labs, and assessment processes are implemented. The project also aims at developing multidisciplinary courses for both programs. The larger impact in Vietnam with new instructional methods and multidisciplinary curriculum are also a long-term target of the project. In the first objective of the project, a number of courses in both curriculums are...
While recent engineering graduates in Vietnam may be technically competitive, they are not work-ready in a global industry because they lack essential soft skills and knowledge such as teamwork, effective communication, problem solving, project management, English proficiency, and an understanding of professional and ethical responsibility. Therefore, they will need to be retrained, which is costly and time consuming for companies. A major reason for this is that the current curriculum does not incorporate these skills and knowledge in a systematic way. Courses providing practice in soft skills, such as “Introduction to Engineering” and “Capstone Project...
In order to fulfill the requirement of industrialization and modernization of Vietnam, an undergraduate mechatronics engineering program was launched at the College of Engineering Technology, Cantho University, in 2003. With the recent introduction of many high-tech companies to Vietnam, however, the demand for high-quality workforce has quickly grown - and is not satisfied by current program graduates. It is; therefore, required to continuously develop the program to keep up with industrial growth. This is a part of the department development plan.
Project Objectives:
The Department of Automation Technology has a vision to continuously improve the program to contribute to a...
Through a collaborative development process, the first cohort of HEEAP faculty representing Hanoi University of Science and Technology (HUST) will develop an “Introduction to Engineering” course. The project vision is to create a standardized set of curriculum materials and course packs that all five HEEAP universities can leverage and easily adapt to the various engineering disciplines. The materials will be accessible through an open course portal site by all faculty and HEEAP institutions.
Freshmen and sophomore undergraduate students choose their major with limited knowledge of what the degree will truly entail. The...
Cohort Year: 2011
Recently, Vietnam has become an attractive destination for many large international companies working in the field of engineering and technology. Engineers graduating from Vietnamese universities are the main workforce in these companies. These graduates are hardworking engineers and have good basic engineering knowledge. However, the students graduating from Cantho University (CTU) lack the essential skills to meet the needs of the industry because active learning, technical communication and applied exercises have not been integrated into their undergraduate engineering courses. To solve this problem, we will apply innovative instructional methodology and ABET criteria to the following...
Recently, globalization has opened many opportunities to Vietnamese industries. These opportunities are in part due to the presence of big corporations such as Intel and SIEMENS. This results in an increased need for work-ready engineers with significant technical knowledge, and basic skills in team work, communication, and project management.
However, most graduates from Danang University of Technology (DUT) do not meet these requirements. The reasons include:
- Students are not taught basic skills in their university courses.
- Students do not have chances to practice the basic skills needed for...
Foreign investment into Vietnam, especially in high-tech fields, has recently been growing. This development requires work-ready engineers with necessary skills to succeed in team-oriented workplaces. However, ineffective teaching methods, passive learning, lack of development of soft skills, engineering skills, and English skills, are becoming alarming issues at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology (HCMUT). Therefore, the purpose of this project at HCMUT is to build selected English-based syllabi with active learning approaches incorporated in the areas of Electrical Engineering (EE) and Mechanical Engineering (ME). Particularly, relevant courses motivated by ABET criteria will be...
For the last ten years, Vietnam has been increasingly more engaged in international economic integration. Specifically, the country is committed to obligations and regulations of regional organization such as AFTA and APEC. After joining World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2007, the opportunities have opened to a completely new market, access to new technology and capital investment, and many more opportunities and challenges for the country.
However, international companies have reported a strong concern for human resources when considering investment in Vietnam. Statistics show that only 40-60% of the demand can be met and there is a biased source of skilled labor since the...
Over the past ten years, Vietnamese Ministry of Education and Training (MOET), along with several Vietnamese universities have made efforts to change and improve the higher education system in Vietnam. However, many engineering graduates in Vietnam are still not competitive in other developing countries both his/hertechnical knowledge and skills.
The engineering graduates are not work-ready in a global industry because they lack essential soft skills such as teamwork, communication skills, English skills, orientation of engineering, and engineering ethics. The major reasons are that curricula are short of soft skill content and modern technology knowledge, most of the faculty...
Cohort Year: 2012
One of CTU’s missions is to provide a well-qualified workforce for Mekong Delta and to Vietnam, broadly. To be well-qualified, engineers need active problem solving skills and effective communication skills, including English skills. To start developing these skills, previous HEEAP cohorts have integrated them into a small number of classes. However, most of CTU’s current classes and faculty still follow a very traditional model of education. Furthermore, when new methods are introduced, they aren’t effectively integrated into the syllabi. Professors assigned teamwork, but they didn’t train students to adapt to the new studying environment. To solve this problem, our project will...
In recent years, globalization has created many opportunities for industries in Central Vietnam and the Western Highlands. Many international corporations, which require a high quality workforce with substantial technical expertise as well as skills in communications and leadership, have invested in various industrial sectors there.
DUT has focused predominantly on quantity rather than quality: We have graduated a large number of students with strong theoretical knowledge, but limited practice skills. What is needed is to find ways to integrate theory and practice using active learning techniques in a resource-poor environment
To solve the problem, we propose to exploit...
Currently, globalization and emerging technologies require engineers with strong technical knowledge, communication and leadership skills, and an engagement in life-long learning. Cooperating with industrial partners, HCMUT has transformed itself to provide market-ready graduates. Specifically, previous HEEAP cohorts have made promising improvements to achieve active, practically-focused and theoretically-informed education.
However, the existing course assessment program is inconsistent, inadequate, and, therefore, ineffective. Additionally, the current curricula too often consist of outdated, theory-focused syllabi and passive instructional...
In recent decades, active learning has become recognized globally as an effective approach to engineering instruction. At HUST, with the help of the HEEAP program over the past 2 years, we have begun to transform the engineering curriculum to include active learning as a key component. However, certain conditions are hindering the expansion of the program; large classes and heavy workloads often discourage faculty from applying active learning techniques. Moreover, many instructors are still not aware of the latest techniques. As a solution, we propose to organize a "Club of Active Learning Troop" or ALT club, training volunteer students for promoting active learning in class. They will...
To become a global engineer, Vietnamese and ASU students must be trained with teamwork, creative thinking, technical communication, and engineering ethics. And these are called the engineering missing basics. Previous HEEAP cohort at UTE has made initial changes to fulfill the industry’s demands. However, the curriculum and learning environment at UTE still do not provide significant training in these missing basics. As a result, several surveys have reported that graduated students always struggle with job interviews when working at international companies.
In this project, we focus on designing a new Global Engineer Course (GEC), to provide the...
Vocational Projects
Cohort Year: 2011
The graduates of Cao Thang Technical College (CTTC) are recruited and employed by many high-tech companies. However, several global companies have provided feedback that some of the Vietnamese engineering graduates are not work ready for the following reasons:
1. Graduates lack the skills to use modern tools.
2. Laboratories in the schools are not well equipped.
3. Graduates’ soft skills are lacking or insufficient (teamwork, presentation skill, written, oral communication skill in English and project management).
Therefore, we would like to apply the active learning techniques we learned...
In Vietnam, at Ho Chi Minh Vocational College of Technology (HVCT) in particular, students’ soft skills have not been a focus in the Vietnamese education system. Most Vietnamese universities focus on teaching students more specialized knowledge to meet the needs of businesses. Although graduates have sufficient knowledge in their content area, they are unable to adapt to the needs of the industry because they lack the confidence in their work, have mediocre teamwork skills and poor engineering ethics. Consequently, it is necessary to integrate soft skills into vocational curriculum at HVCT in order to equip students with more comprehensive knowledge and...
Ho Chi Minh University of Industry (HUI) is recognized as one of leading vocational centers in Vietnam. However, similar to most universities in Vietnam and other developing countries, our students lack many practical and soft skills and as a result they are not work-ready upon graduation. Many potential employers have expressed the need for graduates entering the workforce to be well equipped with practical skills, understand how to troubleshoot, and use soft skills in global communication and when working in group. This project aims to implement active learning methodology to engineering curriculum at HUI in order to better prepare students for the engineering workforce.
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Cohort Year: 2012
The graduates of Cao Thang Technical College (CTTC) are recruited and employed by many high-tech companies. However, several global companies have provided feedback that some of the Vietnamese engineering graduates are not work-ready for the following reasons:
- Graduated students lack soft skills (teamwork, presentation skill, problem solving, etc.)
- Graduated students are not good at reading English technical documents.
To solve this problem, our project will improve soft skills and reading skills in English technical documents for students. We are going to apply active learning techniques into the curriculum at Cao...
Every year, graduate students of Ho Chi Minh University of Industry (HUI) number about 15,000. They study hard and have good knowledge. However, it is difficult for them to find an engineering job. We think they need training in soft skills for success in the life. Therefore, we will have a project to apply soft skills in the electrical and mechanical departments at HUI.
Our group has four persons who will design the syllabi for the object, and will apply presentation and teamwork skills to teach courses that the faculty assign. Besides, we will open some of the classes to teach students how to write, present clearly and confidently the object, and how to work with team.
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Year after year, there are many Vietnamese students who graduate and are face-to-face with joblessness due to the lack of soft skills, specialized skills, and knowledge of a foreign language.
At HVCT, with the help of the HEEAP program in the past year, we have begun to transform the engineering curriculum. However, many students cannot make an application, a speech or a representation. They also do not know how to conduct an interview with employer.
The students also do not know how to work within teams. We want to do something to improve their soft skills to make them stronger in the field and encourage them to progress their English...
