Six undergraduate and three graduate students of Fulbright University Vietnam are awarded this year’s Community Change-Maker Scholarship.
In line with Fulbright’s continued pursuit of nurturing new generations of changemakers in Vietnam, the Community Change-Maker Scholarship was launched in 2021 with the generous support of donors including Temasek, a global investment company headquartered in Singapore.
The Scholarship provides Fulbright students with financial assistance to implement social projects of their dreams for local communities, thus reflecting great confidence from donors in the future of Fulbright and its young people. Recipients of the Community Change-Maker Scholarship are selected based on their track record of academic excellence and the potential impact of their proposed projects.
This year, six Fulbright undergraduates and three Fulbright School of Public Policy and Management (FSPPM) students have won over the Scholarship Panel with projects of wide-ranging originality, thoughtful insight, and inspiring causes.
Having successfully demonstrated their commitment to the betterment of Vietnam society and its broader community, recipients of this year’s Community Change-Maker Scholarship will each receive an award of VND 50,000,000 (equivalent to US$2,137) to realize their projects. These grants do not have any effect on existing financial aid packages.
Nguyễn Thành Phương (Class of 2024)
Thành Phương has been chosen for his Brothers and Sisters Project. The project resulted from his reflection of 5-year volunteer work related to disadvantaged children’s education in his hometown. Through those years, he has continuously challenged himself and the local youth community about the long-term impacts and sustainable values of volunteering activities. Brothers and Sisters project aims towards the transformation of student community service approaches from designing voluntary experience to creating real impact on the end beneficiaries.
Nguyễn Thị Hà Vy (Class of 2025)
Hà Vy will use her Community Change-Maker Scholarship to organize meaningful experiential art activities for the children at the Ha Tinh Orphanage. Believing Art is an effective form of self-expressing and healing, Vy’s ultimate goal is to instill in these children the courage to express themselves creatively, the freedom to have dreams, and confidence in themselves to turn dreams into reality.
Lê Khánh Hà (Class of 2023)
(as known as Lê Kha)
As an active advocate of human rights, especially for the LGBTQIA+ community, Lê Kha is awarded for “Bao”, a project that aims to make higher education more gender-inclusive. For Kha, the project is a great starter to achieve their longer-term pursuit of establishing a social enterprise that provides training and policy consultancy on gender diversity, inclusivity, and equity.
Co-recipients Vũ Đức Huy (Class of 2023) and Đặng Thị Thảo Nguyên (Class of 2025)
Born and raised in Kon Tum province, Đức Huy and Thảo Nguyên have engaged in social projects towards the empowerment of ethnic minority communities. During the past 2 years, they devoted themselves to study, research and plan collaborative activities with the local community to preserve the cultural folk art of Bahnar Tomb House Statues in Kon Tum, while introducing their artistic beauties to the next generations of the Bahnar people and the general public in Vietnam.
In collaboration with local artists, the project is expected to open new angles on wooden statues in Central Highlands to the wide audiences through diverse activities, from digitized artworks to an art exhibition during late 2022 to early 2023.
Mã Y Vân (Class of 2024)
Y Vân currently serves as President at PISE (Project Incubator for Young Social Entrepreneurs), a youth organization that aims to narrow the opportunity gap for the young people of Vietnam and foster their collective actions for positive and sustainable changes within their communities. The scholarship will contribute to a social project she’s been working on at PISE, whose program is to enhance leadership capacity among disadvantaged youths passionate about making a difference in their home regions across the country.
Lê Minh Nhựt (MPP23)
The Community Change-Maker Scholarship will support Minh Nhựt in running the second cycle of “Bệ Phóng Tài Năng”. The bootcamp has been organized to help better position agriculture, to change out-dated mindset and create a favorable environment for young “farmer-entrepreneurs” to experience actual cases. Accordingly, it aims for synergies and collaborations to develop Vietnamese agriculture.
“Bệ Phóng Tài Năng” not only helps young people challenge themselves but also provides opportunities to learn and practice through activities: (i) Inspiration and knowledge enhancement through a series of training activities with leading experts; (ii) Experience through real case-studies at local businesses; (iii) Training and practicing with support from mentors and industry experts and (iv) Building young talents networks to achieve sustainable impacts.
Nguyễn Võ Hoàng Trinh (MPP23)
Hoàng Trinh’s project is geared towards the betterment of farmers in her hometown in the Mekong Delta. Her goal is to help them overcome the perennial issue of oversupply, while inspiring Fulbright students and the young people of Vietnam to come up with innovative solutions for agricultural sustainability and broader societal transformations across the country.
Nguyễn Vũ Khánh Minh (MPP23)
With the Scholarship, Khánh Minh aims to meaningfully engage female rice farmers of the Mekong Delta in the sustainable value chain. The initiative is inspired by her work with grassroot communities when she realized that the role and contribution of women in their families have not been widely and sufficiently acknowledged.
About Temasek:
Temasek is a generational investor, seeking to make a difference always with tomorrow in mind. As an institution, Temasek has a stake in the well-being of the wider community. They recognize that environmental, social and governance factors can impact their stakeholders, as well as long term sustainability of the companies and businesses. They believe in sharing their successes with their communities. With Temasek International overseeing 23 non-profit philanthropic endowments, they have touched 1.5 million lives across Asia and Singapore through their community work.
