HEEAP trained 24 professors this year in its 2016 Vocational Cohort. Each year the cohort brings Vietnamese college faculty to ASU for four weeks where they attend sessions and workshops led by ASU faculty and experts from industry. With the support of Intel and other industry leaders the program teaches the professors how to collaborate with U.S. schools in curriculum design, research and student projects to produce work-ready engineers and effectively make engineering education in Vietnam more hands-on.
CTTC students in Professor Thoai Khanh Nguyen’s class use a guide working in groups to draw the short cylinder turning machine.
Professors Thoai Khanh Nguyen from Cao Thang Technical College and Phuc Huy Nguyen from the Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City graduated from this year’s HEEAP Vocational Cohort and went on to successfully apply knowledge from the program directly to their Vietnamese college classrooms.
Khanh Nguyen introduced a team building activity, which he developed while training at ASU, to teach mechanical engineering students about a short cylinder turning machine. On the first day of the semester he separated his students into small groups and gave them 15 minutes to draw the machine and label its key parts in English.
Before the activity, Khanh Nguyen noted that students found it hard to focus during the lecture and wasted time on their smartphones. However, during the team building activity, all students were actively involved in the learning process.
Professor Phuc Huy Nguyen used a game known as the “Marshmallow Challenge” to encourage teamwork in his Physics class at IUH.
Referring to the changes he implemented at IUH, Huy Nguyen stated, “I applied new teaching methods I learned from my HEEAP training this summer. I rebuilt my courses and added more activities in my classes.”
September 9, 2016