Impact of australian government scholarships on the development of higher education in vietnam

The Australia Awards consist of two types of awards: (i) Development Awards, which are administered by AusAID and include the Australian Development Scholarships (ADS) a[r]

IMPACT OF AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT SCHOLARSHIPS ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF HIGHER EDUCATION IN VIETNAM

Graham Alliband

Australian Scholarships for Development in Vietnam Program.

Abstract

Over 4,000 scholarships (both long and short term) have been funded directly or indirectly through the Australian Governm ent’s international aid agency since 1974 Currently up to 250 Development Awards comprising Australian Developm ent Scholarships (ADS) and Australian Leadership Award Scholarships (ALAS) are awarded to Vietnam annually under the Australia Awards scheme The scholarships are for post-graduate studies and are targeted at three Profiles A recent Tracer s tu d y of alumni suggests that the study experience in Australia has had profound impact on teaching and research methodology, skills and approaches in higher education and research The scholarship program has had particular impact on the development of TESOL in higher education with 505 Vietnam ese recorded as having studied TESOL/ELICOS O f these, 156 are currently working in universities/colleges with almost two-thirds concentrated in four universities Many are in senior positions enabling them to influence national TESOL policy and determine teaching methodologies and curriculum Australian scholarships have played a key role in training a core group of alumni, who have been instrumental in establishing a national quality system in higher education The six alumni who graduated in Education Testing and Assessment before 2000 became key experts in policy development, consultancy and training in education quality Australian scholarships have had a significant impact on Central Government Agencies whose employees have received 633 scholarships, including 143 from affiliated research institutions In the current program, 40% of scholarships are targeted at these central agencies

BACKGROUND

Australia has a long history o f providing scholarships to Vietnam and has currently the largest scholarship program of any country fo r Vietnamese students Scholarships have been an im portant part of Australia’s overseas aid program for the last six decades However, unlike the long-standing scholarship programs in other Southeast Asian countries, Australia’s scholarship program fo r Vietnam has lacked continuity because of changing political and international circumstances Due to this lack of continuity in programming, the records o f scholarships awarded prior to the resumption o f Australian bilateral aid relations with Vietnam in 1992 are not complete, but it is estimated that over 4,000 short and long term scholarships have been funded through the Australian Government’s international aid agency (now called AusAID) since 197433

Australia did not have bilateral aid relations with Vietnam, Australia funded 233 scholarships for English Language training (TESOL Masters and Diploma and ELICOS) at the now University o f Canberra using UNDP as the funding channel

Australia Awards

In 2009, the Australian Government introduced the concept of the Australia Awards to bring all Australian Government scholarships under a single recognizable brand The Australia Awards consist of two types of awards: (i) Development Awards, which are administered by AusAID and include the Australian Development Scholarships (ADS) and short and long term Australian Leadership Awards (ALA), and (ii) the Endeavour Awards, which are administered by the Australian Department of Industry, Innovation, Science, Research and Tertiary Education (This paper refers only to Development Awards)

In Vietnam both ADS and the ALA Scholarships (ALAS) target priority human resource and development needs ALAS are awarded to applicants who have demonstrated outstanding or emergent leadership qualities In 2011, ADS and ALAS in Vietnam were consolidated into a single, on-line application and selection process, but with the final decision on ALAS awards being made in Canberra, as the ALAS remains a regionally competitive program

Development Awards

Currently up to 250 Development Awards (botth ADS and ALAS) are awarded to Vietnam annually which represents a substantial increase over previous years From 2010, profiles were introduced which targeted applicants in sectors that were more closely aligned with the Australian development cooperation strategy fo r Vietnam Targeting by profile also sought to meet two Vietnamese Government HRD priorities in higher education - increasing the number of university lecturers with doctorates, and improving the quality of TESOL programs

The current three profiles with target percentages are:

Profile - Local Government Officials and Development Workers (30%) p rofi lẽ“2 ~ C ẽ n t r a r e 0 ve rn m e n fO ffi cials(40°/o)

Profile - Tertiary Lecturers (including TESOL) and Researchers (30%)

All scholarships are for post-graduate studies only The number of PhDs is targeted at 20% of total scholarships and all PhD scholarships are currently allocated to tertiary level lecturers and researchers under Profile

Analysis of Alumni Population

Num ber o f Alumni: According to a Monitoring & Evaluation analysis undertaken at the end of 2010, the scholarship database had 3,097 alumni of long term scholarships dating from 1977 O f this total, 116 alumni have retired, 341 were overseas (around half are studying higher degrees) and 495 were untraceable With approximately 300 alumni not on the database fo r w hatever reason, this comes to a total o f around 3,400 alumni who had received long term scholarships as at the end of 2010

Sex breakdown: An analysis of the sex breakdown on the database showed that 47.5% of alumni were female and 52.5%, male, but from 2003 the database shows that the number of female alumni was higher than men This reversal in ratio in favor o f female alumni is reflected in the current disproportionate 60% of scholarships being won by fem ale applicants It is noteworthy that this favorable ratio for female scholarship awardees is across all Profiles and categories of applicants, including local government and ethnic minority applicants This suggests that the Vietnamese Government policies on promotion of gender equality in recruitment in public administration and in the education sector, in particular, are having some success

Level o f study: The database shows the following level of study breakdown: Masters: 1,708 (56%), Undergraduate: 795 (26%), Graduate Diploma: 341 (11%), PhD: 95 (3%) and o th e r: 129 (4%) around half of whom studied ELICOS Over the past few years the program has been reshaped to focus only on post­ graduate awards with the percentage of PhDs substantially replacing undergraduates (PhDs now account for 20% of total scholarships awarded in line with the Vietnamese Governm ent’s policies to increase the number of doctorates in tertiary education positions.)

Current em ploym ent sector The alumni employment sector is broken down broadly to Public Servants (Central and Local Government): 313 (18%), Civil Servants: Education and Research Institutions: 791 (46%) and Hospitals/Medical Centres: 31 (2%), Private Sector: 421 (25%), Civil Society: 83 (5%), and International/UN Agencies/Embassies: 64 (4%) While very broad in categorization, these statistics show that recipients of Australian Government scholarships are employed across all sectors with almost two thirds in the public sector

Fields o f em ploym ent A more detailed breakdown of the fields of alumni em ploym ent shows that the predominant fields are Business and Commerce 30% and Education 20% o th e r fields of employment include Science and Technology 11%, Agriculture and Rural Development 8%, Public Administration 5%, Economics 4%, International Relations 4%, Environment 3% and Health 3% The high percentage of those employed in business and commerce reflects an early em phasis in the 1990s on using the scholarship program to build skills in private enterprise This high percentage is gradually decreasing as the scholarship program has now moved sharply away from targeting applicants from private enterprise, as the current three profiles demonstrate A concomitant change has been few er applicants from urban areas and more from the provinces over the last three scholarship rounds This reflects the scholarship program's current objective of strengthening capacity in the provinces in both public administration and in tertiary education

Organizational and Personal Impact

percentage of alumni working in fields related to their Australian studies This assessment was further confirmed in a recent Tracer stu d y involving 796 alumni when 62% of respondents thought that their study was relevant ‘to a great extent’ to their current positions and 64% responded that their enhanced skills and knowledge had helped them meet their current organization’s needs

it is noteworthy that the Tracer stu d y survey respondents indicated that the two areas where the greatest contributions were being made to Vietnam ’s development by alumni were in ‘Teaching and Learning’ and ‘Research’ This suggests that the study experience in Australia has had considerable impact on such areas as teaching and research methodology, skills and approaches in higher education and research institutions This is borne out by individual responses in the Tracer stu d y who gave many examples of how their teaching and research effectiveness had improved

Significantly,- survey-respondents also outlined a range of soft skills and lifestyle approaches that w e re - developed as a result of studies and life experiences in Australia, such as analytical and critical thinking, problem solving and communication skills, time management skills, and cultural awareness etc Improvement o f English language ability was clearly a valuable result o f the scholarships, enhancing professional access and linkages as well as personal sophistication Thus soft skills and personal development are very significant, if not always measured, outcomes of the Australian scholarship program

Impact on TESOL in Higher Education

The Australian Governm ent scholarship program has had particular impact on the development of TESOL in higher education in Vietnam A total of 505 Vietnamese are recorded in the database as having studied TESOL/ELICÒS, alm ost half under the AusAID-funded scholarships for English Language training under UNDP between 1984 and 1991 Over 100 o f these alumni have now retired O f this 505 total, 231 graduates are recorded in the alumni database as currently living and working in Vietnam and, of this number, 156 (including studying overseas) are known to be working in universities/colleges in various teaching and academ ic leadership positions

A large number of TESOL graduates are living and working in Hanoi especially in two universities - V ietnam N ationalU niversity,H anoi-(35)-and hH anoi University-(22-).-Other-concentrations of-alum niare- found in Hue University (23) and Can Tho University (12) Surprisingly, HCM City only has a total of 12 alumni across several universities Many of the alumni are in senior positions, e.g Rectors/Vice Rectors and 19 Faculty Deans/Vice Deans, which enable them to influence national TESOL policy and determine the direction of curriculum development and teaching methodologies within the education system

Impact on Education Quality

Impact on Central Government Agencies

Another area where Australian scholarships have had a significant impact on institutional strengthening is Central Government Ministries and agencies (CGAs) Employees of government ministries have always comprised a large proportion of scholarship awardees However, in 2004 the scholarship program started to explicitly target selected CGAs in the Priority Public Institutions program which aimed at building a pool o f alumni in key agencies and thus enhancing institutional capacity within Government In the current scholarship program, 40% of total scholarships are targeted at CGAs under Profile

Current statistics show that since the bilateral scholarship program was resumed in 1992 a total of 633 AusAID-funded scholarships have been awarded to CGA employees This figure can be broken down into employees of the central administrative organs (490) and research institutes/centres (143) affiliated with these agencies Ministries that have benefited the most have been the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (106 o f whom 82 are research staff), Ministry o f Planning and Investment (80), state Bank of Vietnam and Ministry of Finance (both 72) and Ministry o f Foreign Affairs (49) In the Ministry of Education and Training, 25 employees, including research staff, have been scholarship recipients Beneficiaries of the scholarship program have reached the highest levels of Government - a Deputy Prime Minister, a Minister, several Vice Ministers and many Director-Generals and Directors Clearly alumni in senior and mid-level Governm ent positions are able to influence policy and law-making in many different areas

Conclusion

It can be seen that the Australian Government scholarship program has made a significant contribution not only to the higher education sector but more broadly across key areas o f Vietnam's development This contribution is likely to be enhanced as more recently returned alumni move into more senior positions and as the impact of the recent increase in scholarship awards becomes evident

REFERENCES

1 2011 Vietnam Tracer stu d y of Australian Scholarships Alumni, Australian Scholarships for Development in Vietnam (ASDiV) Program, March 2012