Doan Van Dieu: Education in Vietnam

I really enjoyed Professor Doan Van Dieu's presentation on Monday. I found a couple things very fascinating. The first was that he was from Vietnam. Vietnam was a very controversial war in which may be still very fresh in many American's minds. I thought it was a sign of courage and humility for Doan to come over to the U.S. and also for the U.S. to have him come over. It made me feel that Americans can move forward and accept new cultures. And this is exactly what Doan did. He talked about three main points in his presentation, parents roles in children's marriage, students viewpoints on the role of the family and of women, and parents expectations of children. I found these topics very interesting. I think that a typical Vietnamese child has very similar beliefs as an American child. Both want to make their own choices that rarely involve parents. They enjoy their freedom. However, Vietnamese seem to value their family life a lot more than American culture. This is because of their culture and how traditions were set up. Sometimes I wish American children were more concerned with family values than we seem to be. I really liked how Doan described marriage as "shared freedom." Another thing that I found interesting was the study about the roles that women play in the Vietnamese society. Doan said that sex equality is very obvious in Vietnam. If this is true why did the study done? This statement kind of made me feel as if the survey showed what youth want in their society and not what is actually present. I also thought that the results of the survey on what parents expect of their children was interesting. I really like how important education and success was to parents, but what about children who have disabilities? What do parents expect of these children? I wish I would have thought of that question during Doans presentation. I found Doan Van Dieu's presentation very interesting and am glad that I was able to hear about his culture so that my eyes could be opened to different education practices throughout the world.