- Media
IDG plans 500 scholarships for locals in 10 years
International Data Group (IDG), the world’s leading technology media, research and event company, will provide 500 scholarships for Vietnamese people to study abroad in the next 10 years.
IDG founder and chairman Patrick McGovern announced the scholarships at the opening of a two-day workshop on information and communications technology in education in Hanoi yesterday.
The first scholarships will be granted to the winners of an IT contest set for June.
I’m extremely impressed about the development of IT in education in Vietnam compared to 30 or 40 countries I have visited,¨ said McGovern, who wraps up his four-day Vietnam visit today.
The number of students studying IT in Vietnam has grown 125% in the last three years.¨ He said Prime Minister Phan Van Khai had said Vietnam would invest US$1 billion in IT in the next 10 years, and train one million students of IT, so two million low-cost computers would be needed.
Vietnamese Deputy Minister of Post and Telematics Mai Liem Truc told the workshop that building a big pool of IT experts was key to the improvement of educational quality. He said the IT work force needed to have a good command of English, which many fresh IT graduates lacked at the moment.
Quach Tuan Ngoc, director of the IT center of the Ministry of Education and Training, said 96% of high schools nationwide had been hooked up with the Internet by late 2003.
IT training is needed for up to 19 million students at various levels now, he said at the workshop, attended by 700 representatives from the education departments nationwide, 200 universities and colleges, and 300 vocational schools.
IDG on Tuesday opened an office in Hanoi as a commitment to long-term business and investment in the country.
The same day saw IDG Ventures, the global venture capital firm of IDG, opening a branch in Vietnam with an aim of investing US$100 million in emerging Vietnamese IT companies by 2010.
Reported by Tran Cong