What cooperation model for scientific research?

Educators all clearly recognize that in order to improve the quality of undergraduate and postgraduate training, one of the things to be done immediately is to improve the quality of scientific research. How to do research in Vietnam with quality, known to colleagues in the world?

Mr. Dao Van Luong, former director of Ho Chi Minh City Department of Science and Technology, is also a professor of chemical technology at Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology, in a summary of scientific research activities, before his retirement. The period wrote: ' One of the main concerns is the ability and mechanism of gathering scientific forces, exerting the gray matter . struggling forever but not doing better yet.

I also wondered many times why my scientists were 'thrown' into the machines of advanced countries, which ran quite well, but also with those people, working in our machines has limitations. (Tuoi Tre, June 25, 2006). On the occasion of accompanying several graduate students to do a doctoral thesis at the Polytechnic University over the past few years, I completely shared his concern.

Like all other industries, scientific research activities need to meet several conditions: equipment, budget, human resources, organizational mechanism . Consider quickly on these conditions:

Media - equipment

Currently many laboratories at research institutes or national universities . are equipped with many modern machines and equipment. For example, along with the rapid development of the information technology industry, many groups now have electronic computer platforms that are not inferior to similar groups in Southeast Asia or Europe (Eastern Europe).

In today's globalized economy, having good equipment is not difficult. Have money, have a budget to buy it immediately (unless banned). The rest is how these state-of-the-art devices are used for scientific research, this depends on bravery, knowledge and organization and management.

Budget

Currently, the State budget of Vietnam is reserved for the education sector in general, and scientific research in particular, is not small compared to the total national income (GDP). A state-level research program received billions of dong in a few years, the number that many Western European research teams wish for! The problem is how this budget has been used for scientific research purposes.

The new high-quality engineers of the 2001-2006 academic year of Ho Chi Minh City Polytechnic University were happy after receiving a diploma with the PFIEV appendix issued by France on February 9, 2007.This is a cooperation program between the Ministry of Education and Training and the French Embassy for training high quality engineers in Vietnam

I know a colleague who asked for VND 3 billion to build a very powerful electronic computer rig, but the agency did not have a budget to pay for graduate students, so there were few users, eventually rig almost abandoned and a few years later degraded . Many such waste can be told.

One shortcoming is that research programs in Vietnam do not have a budget to pay for scholarships (salaries) for students, fellows (SV-NCS) and collaborators. Masters students rarely receive remuneration, students have to do something else to live. Meanwhile Belgian federal research programs spend at least 60% of the budget to pay collaborators and scholarships for students.

The SV-NCS does not have a full, stable salary with the school's budget, or the instructor's guidance, making them not wholeheartedly and deliberately engaged in scientific activities. Scientific research is an innovative thinking activity, requiring the highest concentration to get discovered that leads to scientific works. In my opinion, there should be clear regulations on remuneration for students-students, not depending on the kindness (and arbitrary) of the project managers.

Human

As in an army going to war, there are generals and soldiers, the fact that a Vietnamese student or a Vietnamese student can work in a laboratory overseas but is not allowed to work in the country, shows that the above mentioned trouble It must be because of SV-NCS VN, ie the army in scientific research, lack of ability. Due to the lack of up-to-date training at university level, there are many holes in basic knowledge, Vietnamese students often face many difficulties in the early period when studying abroad. But most can absorb new knowledge, fill gaps and after being instructed, start independent research after a short time. In summary, it can be said that in scientific research in Vietnam, the army is not bad but the general is not good!

At this point, Mr. Dao Van Luong wrote: '. We do not have great leaders . I think in Vietnam or Ho Chi Minh City, to find these leaders very difficult' (Tuoi Tre , June 25, 2006). Perhaps scientific research in Vietnam is currently lacking serious birds leading enough to fly high, fly far, and especially know how to lead the flight to any direction!

Organizational mechanism

In the context of the above human resources, a solution was proposed (long time) is to bring students and students to study in advanced scientific countries. For example, the Government set out a long-term "322" program to bring more students to study abroad with the state budget. In international cooperation, many scholarship programs of advanced countries are set up for students and students of Vietnam. However, as mentioned above, many people have achieved excellent doctoral thesis abroad, when returning to Vietnam to re-enter the old machine, they still do not, or not, bring the desired effect.

After ten years, a series of doctors have been trained and returned home but still lack the leading birds in scientific research! Scientific cooperation programs, co-instructing PhD students with Western European universities (co-tuteur, co-promoter, sandwich doctoral programs) have been made very reasonable in theory, but in fact the cooperation is still available. progress in one direction.

During the study program in Vietnam, students-students often do not perform much because they often have to worry about running hundreds of names and unnamed work for the agency; they have less time to concentrate on research. Vietnamese instructors often play a modest role in front of their peers.

Research topics are often recommended by foreign colleagues. I am afraid that the goal of the ' 322 program ' in order to train doctors according to country needs in this way is difficult to accomplish. In 2006, with a large number of human resources and investments of the State, the chemical industry of the whole country only published no more than a few dozen works in international journals. This modest figure is only the result of an average group in Europe and America. That is the quantity, and the quality of these articles is another matter.

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NGUYEN MINH THO (Professor of Chemistry, University of Leuven, Belgium)