關於 final year project proposal ，我們在網路上蒐集到這些相關的討論、資訊與評價

[USA]_List of lots of scholarship in the US. Please help to share and tag your friend. You can google the name of the scholarship to get direct link!

Xin gửi đến các bạn một số học bổng cho chương trình Cử Nhân, Thạc sĩ, Tiến sĩ, Học giả tại Hoa Kỳ. Ngoài ra, tại các ÐH Mỹ (top 200) đều có học bổng cho chương trình Thạc sĩ & Tiến sĩ, các bạn tham khảo trên website của Department tìm hiểu về Fellowship, Research Assistantship, Teaching Assistantship.
National Universities Rankings: http://colleges.usnews.rankingsandreviews.com/…/national-un…

1. Southeast Asia Youth Leadership Program (SEAYLP)
http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/yseali.html
This intensive four-week exchange program in the United States aims at promoting high-quality leadership, civic responsibility, volunteerism, and respect for diversity. Each year, five Vietnamese high-school students and one teacher (who acts as chaperone) are selected for this program and are joined by similar groups from other Southeast Asian countries. It is designed to enable teenagers, ages 15-17, and teachers to travel to the United States for a program focused on building a sense of community, developing civil society and economic institutions, and recognizing the commonalities among Southeast Asians and Americans.
Timeline
July-August: Call for applications
September: Submission of applications to the Embassy; screening and interviews
October: Nomination of finalists to Washington
November: Selection results available from Washington; departure of selected candidates
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

2. Undergraduate Intensive English Language Study Program (UIELSP)
This program enrolls undergraduate students in the East Asia and Pacific region who demonstrate the potential to become student leaders in an eight-week intensive English Language course at colleges and universities in the United States with a focus on English language acquisition, leadership skill building, and civic education and engagement. It also provides participants with an introduction to American institutions, society and culture.
Timeline
Oct-Nov: Call for applications
December: Deadline for submission of applications to the Embassy
Dec-Jan: Screening of applications; interviews of shortlisted candidates
February: Nomination of finalists to Washington
March: Selection and placement results available from Washington
June: Departure of selected candidates
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

3. Global Undergraduate Exchange Program (Global UGRAD)
This program provides scholarships for one semester or one academic year of study at a U.S. university. The goal is to provide a diverse group of emerging student leaders, from non-elite and under-represented groups, with a substantive exchange experience at a U.S. college or university, with in-depth exposure to U.S. society, culture and academic institutions. Students are selected based on 1) academic record, 2) leadership skills and potential, 3) community involvement and extra-curricular activities, and 4) English proficiency (minimum TOEFL score of 525 (paper-based) or 70 (iBT).
Timeline
September: Call for applications
November: Deadline for submission of applications to the Embassy
Nov-Dec: Screening of applications; interviews of shortlisted candidates
December: Nomination of finalists to Washington
March: Selection results available from Washington
June: Placement information available
July: Departure of selected candidates (whole academic year program)
January: Departure of selected candidates (semester program)
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

4. Fulbright Vietnamese Student Program
The Fulbright Vietnamese Student Program is a competitive, merit-based scholarship program which recruits and nominates young Vietnamese professionals for Master’s degree programs at U.S. universities. Approximately 20 to 25 fully-funded scholarships are granted on an annual basis for students in social sciences and humanities. Successful applicants will receive support in university placement and a full scholarship which covers tuition and fees, monthly stipend, round-trip airfare to the U.S. and health insurance. Selection is based on study objectives, work experience, understanding of the chosen field of study, impact potential, leadership, academic excellence and English proficiency.
Timeline
December: Grant announcement
April: Application deadline
June – July: Application review and semi-finalist selection
September: Interviews & finalist selection
October: Finalists take GRE/GMAT/TOEFL iBT
November: U.S. universities placement
April - May: Confirmation of final university placement
May: Pre-departure orientation
June – July: Medical check-up and visa application
July – August: Departure
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

5. Vietnamese Fulbright Scholar Program
The Council for International Exchange of Scholars (CIES) assists in the administration of the Fulbright Scholar Exchange Program for faculty and professionals. Started in 1998, the Program recruits and nominates Vietnamese scholars for placement by CIES as lecturers and researchers in U.S. universities for terms of three to 10 months. From six to eight scholars from Vietnam travel to the United States on an annual basis.
Timeline
October: Deadline of application submission
November – December: Peer Review Panel
January: Interview the shortlisted candidates
End of January: Submission of semi-finalist candidates to Washington
February - March: Selection results available from Washington
April – July: Affiliation and Visa Process
August: Pre-departure Orientation for the departing grantee
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

6. Hubert H. Humphrey Fellowship Program
This is a one year, non-degree, full scholarship program offered to promising mid-career professionals who have proven track records of leadership and a strong commitment to public service. Participants in the program spend one academic year at a leading U.S. university doing their self-designed program of academic course work, participating in professional affiliations off-campus, field trips, special workshops and seminars in their field of study.
Timeline
April: Call for applications
May: Information sessions held in Hanoi and HCMC
Early August: Deadline for submission of applications to the Embassy
Aug-Sep: Screening of applications; Institutional TOEFL for shortlisted candidates; interviews
October 1: Nomination of finalists to Washington
October: Finalists take official iBT
Feb-Mar: Selection results available from Washington
March/April: Departure for the U.S. (fellows needing Long Term English)
May: Placement results available
June-August: Departure for the U.S. (fellows not needing Long Term English)
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

7. Ambassador’s Fund for Cultural Preservation – AFCP
Since its creation by the U.S. Congress in 2001, the U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation has provided financial support to more than 640 cultural preservation projects in more than 100 countries. The AFCP shows the depth of the U.S. respect for the cultural heritage of other countries. Ten preservation projects in Vietnam, averaging $20,000 each, have been funded by the AFCP, ranging from intangible heritage such as the Then Music of the Tay minority to tangibles such as pagoda statues, museum collections and historical/architectural monuments. In 2010, a major project ($74,500) was granted to Hanoi Department of Culture, Sports and Tourism to preserve the 18th century O Quan Chuong Gate – the only one of the 16 gates that remains of ancient Hanoi, as a gift from the U.S. Ambassador to the people of Hanoi as the city celebrated its 1000th birthday.
Timeline for the 2011 AFCP program:
October: Calls for proposals from Vietnamese organizations
Nov: Proposal Screening
December: Submission of proposal to Washington
July: Selection results available from Washington
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

8. Small Grants Program for civil society organizations
The Small Grants Program is designed to assist countries around the world to strengthen democracy, human rights, civil society, and rule of law, and to combat extremism in their countries by making grants of up to $20,000 to local non-governmental and not-for-profit organizations. Proposals must support program activities that promote democratic practices, including civil society, freedom of information and independent media, transparency in government, NGO capacity building, rule of law and judicial reform, civic education, conflict resolution, human rights, ethnic, minority and women's rights.
Timeline
March: Call for proposals from Vietnamese organizations
May: Submission of proposals by Vietnamese organizations
May-June: Proposal screening by Embassy Committee
June: Submission of shortlisted proposals to Washington
August: Selection results available from Washington
Contact: Contact info: Tel: 84-4-3850-5000; Email: [email protected].
Source: http://vietnam.usembassy.gov/educational_exchange.html…

9. VEF Fellowship Program for 2018 (?)
The Fellowship application and selection process is open, competitive, and transparent. Applicants do not need to pay any fees to anyone in order to apply or be considered for a VEF Fellowship. Winners are chosen based on individual merit, including academic performance and preparation, intellectual capabilities, English proficiency, and the potential for contribution to scientific education and research.
Contact: fellowship@vef.gov, information@vef.gov
Source: http://www.vef.gov/details.php?mid=6&cid=392
10. VEF Visiting Scholar Program 2017 - 2018 (?)
VEF Visiting Scholar Program (VSP) for Vietnamese nationals, who already hold a doctorate in any of the fields supported by VEF, namely, in the major disciplines of sciences (natural, physical, and environmental), mathematics, medicine (such as, public health), and technology (including information technology). Fields include the basic sciences, such as, biology, chemistry, and physics, as well as agricultural science, computer science, and engineering. Priority this year will be given to applicants, whose field of study focuses on climate change (environmental sciences) or on nuclear energy, provided that all other qualifications are equal.
Contact: vs@vef.gov, information@vef.gov
Source: http://www.vef.gov/details.php?mid=7&cid=393

A GOOD READ from one of the greatest leader that lived, #SINGAPORE's founding man, #LeeKuanYew

THIS MUST BE SHARED AND THOROUGHLY READ BY EVERY FILIPINO... Its quite long but it will surely strengthen our minds but then at the end, I was like "SAYANG!!!"
It came from the SINGAPORE'S FOUNDING MAN ITSELF, former Prime Minister LEE KUAN YEW on how the Philippines should have become, IF ONLY...

I've just read it and, its point blank!
Its a good read
____________

(The following excerpt is taken from pages 299 – 305 from Lee Kuan Yew’s book “From Third World to First”, Chapter 18 “Building Ties with Thailand, the Philippines, and Brunei”)

*

The Philippines was a world apart from us, running a different style of politics and government under an American military umbrella. It was not until January 1974 that I visited President Marcos in Manila. When my Singapore Airlines plane flew into Philippine airspace, a small squadron of Philippine Air Force jet fighters escorted it to Manila Airport. There Marcos received me in great style – the Filipino way. I was put up at the guest wing of Malacañang Palace in lavishly furnished rooms, valuable objects of art bought in Europe strewn all over. Our hosts were gracious, extravagant in hospitality, flamboyant. Over a thousand miles of water separated us. There was no friction and little trade. We played golf, talked about the future of ASEAN, and promised to keep in touch.

His foreign minister, Carlos P. Romulo, was a small man of about five feet some 20 years my senior, with a ready wit and a self-deprecating manner about his size and other limitations. Romulo had a good sense of humor, an eloquent tongue, and a sharp pen, and was an excellent dinner companion because he was a wonderful raconteur, with a vast repertoire of anecdotes and witticisms. He did not hide his great admiration for the Americans. One of his favourite stories was about his return to the Philippines with General MacArthur. As MacArthur waded ashore at Leyte, the water reached his knees but came up to Romulo’s chest and he had to swim ashore. His good standing with ASEAN leaders and with Americans increased the prestige of the Marcos administration. Marcos had in Romulo a man of honor and integrity who helped give a gloss of respectability to his regime as it fell into disrepute in the 1980s.

In Bali in 1976, at the first ASEAN summit held after the fall of Saigon, I found Marcos keen to push for greater economic cooperation in ASEAN. But we could not go faster than the others. To set the pace, Marcos and I agreed to implement a bilateral Philippines-Singapore across-the-board 10 percent reduction of existing tariffs on all products and to promote intra-ASEAN trade. We also agreed to lay a Philippines-Singapore submarine cable. I was to discover that for him, the communiqué was the accomplishment itself; its implementation was secondary, an extra to be discussed at another conference.

We met every two to three years. He once took me on a tour of his library at Malacañang, its shelves filled with bound volumes of newspapers reporting his activities over the years since he first stood for elections. There were encyclopedia-size volumes on the history and culture of the Philippines with his name as the author. His campaign medals as an anti-Japanese guerrilla leader were displayed in glass cupboards. He was the undisputed boss of all Filipinos. Imelda, his wife, had a penchant for luxury and opulence. When they visited Singapore before the Bali summit they came in stye in two DC8’s, his and hers.

Marcos did not consider China a threat for the immediate future, unlike Japan. He did not rule out the possibility of an aggressive Japan, if circumstances changed. He had memories of the horrors the Imperial Army had inflicted on Manila. We had strongly divergent views on the Vietnamese invasion and occupation of Cambodia. While he, pro forma, condemned the Vietnamese occupation, he did not consider it a danger to the Philippines. There was the South China Sea separating them and the American navy guaranteed their security. As a result, Marcos was not active on the Cambodian question. Moreover, he was to become preoccupied with the deteriorating security in his country.

Marcos, ruling under martial law, had detained opposition leader Benigno (Ninoy) Aquino, reputed to be as charismatic and powerful a campaigner as he was. He freed Aquino and allowed him to go to the United States. As the economic situation in the Philippines deteriorated, Aquino announced his decision to return. Mrs. Marcos issued several veiled warnings. When the plane arrived at Manila Airport from Taipei in August 1983, he was shot as he descended from the aircraft. A whole posse of foreign correspondents with television camera crews accompanying him on the aircraft was not enough protection.

International outrage over the killing resulted in foreign banks stopping all loans to the Philippines, which owed over US$25 billion and could not pay the interest due. This brought Marcos to the crunch. He sent his minister for trade and industry, Bobby Ongpin, to ask me for a loan of US$300-500 million to meet the interest payments. I looked him straight in the eye and said, “We will never see that money back.” Moreover, I added, everyone knew that Marcos was seriously ill and under constant medication for a wasting disease. What was needed was a strong, healthy leader, not more loans.

Shortly afterward, in February 1984, Marcos met me in Brunei at the sultanate’s independence celebrations. He had undergone a dramatic physical change. Although less puffy than he had appeared on television, his complexion was dark as if he had been out in the sun. He was breathing hard as he spoke, his voice was soft, eyes bleary, and hair thinning. He looked most unhealthy. An ambulance with all the necessary equipment and a team of Filipino doctors were on standby outside his guest bungalow. Marcos spent much of the time giving me a most improbable story of how Aquino had been shot.

As soon as all our aides left, I went straight to the point, that no bank was going to lend him any money. They wanted to know who was going to succeed him if anything were to happen to him; all the bankers could see that he no longer looked healthy. Singapore banks had lent US$8 billion of the US$25 billion owing. The hard fact was they were not likely to get repayment for some 20 years. He countered that it would be only eight years. I said the bankers wanted to see a strong leader in the Philippines who could restore stability, and the Americans hoped the election in May would throw up someone who could be such a leader. I asked whom he would nominate for the election. He said Prime Minister Cesar Virata. I was blunt. Virata was a nonstarter, a first-class administrator but no political leader; further, his most politically astute colleague, defense minister Juan Ponce Enrile, was out of favour. Marcos was silent, then he admitted that succession was the nub of the problem. If he could find a successor, there would be a solution. As I left, he said, “You are a true friend.” I did not understand him. It was a strange meeting.

With medical care, Marcos dragged on. Cesar Virata met me in Singapore in January the following year. He was completely guileless, a political innocent. He said that Mrs. Imelda Marcos was likely to be nominated as the presidential candidate. I asked how that could be when there were other weighty candidates, including Juan Ponce Enrile and Blas Ople, the labor minister. Virata replied it had to do with “flow of money; she would have more money than other candidates to pay for the votes needed for nomination by the party and to win the election. He added that if she were the candidate, the opposition would put up Mrs. Cory Aquino and work up the people’s feelings. He said the economy was going down with no political stability.

The denouement came in February 1986 when Marcos held presidential elections which he claimed he won. Cory Aquino, the opposition candidate, disputed this and launched a civil disobedience campaign. Defense Minister Juan Enrile defected and admitted election fraud had taken place, and the head of the Philippine constabulary, Lieutenant General Fidel Ramos, joined him. A massive show of “people power” in the streets of Manila led to a spectacular overthrow of a dictatorship. The final indignity was on 25 February 1986, when Marcos and his wife fled in U.S. Air Force helicopters from Malacañang Palace to Clark Air Base and were flown to Hawaii. This Hollywood-style melodrama could only have happened in the Philippines.

Mrs. Aquino was sworn in as president amid jubilation. I had hopes that this honest, God-fearing woman would help regain confidence for the Philippines and get the country back on track. I visited her that June, three months after the event. She was a sincere, devout Catholic who wanted to do her best for her country by carrying out what she believed her husband would have done had he been alive, namely, restore democracy to the Philippines. Democracy would then solve their economic and social problems. At dinner, Mrs. Aquino seated the chairman of the constitutional commission, Chief Justice Cecilia Muñoz-Palma, next to me. I asked the learned lady what lessons her commission had learned from the experience of the last 40 years since independence in 1946 would guide her in drafting the constitution. She answered without hesitation, “We will not have any reservations or limitations on our democracy. We must make sure that no dictator can ever emerge to subvert the constitution.” Was there no incompatibility of the American-type separation of powers with the culture and habits of the Filipino people that had caused problems for the presidents before Marcos? Apparently none.

Endless attempted coups added to Mrs. Aquino’s problems. The army and the constabulary had been politicized. Before the ASEAN summit in December 1987, a coup was threatened. Without President Suharto’s firm support the summit would have been postponed and confidence in Aquino’s government undermined. The Philippine government agreed that the responsibility for security should be shared between them and the other ASEAN governments, in particular the Indonesian government. General Benny Moerdani, President Suharto’s trusted aide, took charge. He positioned an Indonesian warship in the middle of Manila Bay with helicopters and a commando team ready to rescue the ASEAN heads of government if there should be a coup attempt during the summit. I was included in their rescue plans. I wondered if such a rescue could work but decided to go along with the arrangements, hoping that the show of force would scare off the coup leaders. We were all confined to the Philippine Plaza Hotel by the seafront facing Manila Bay where we could see the Indonesian warship at anchor. The hotel was completely sealed off and guarded. The summit went off without any mishap. We all hoped that this show of united support for Mrs. Aquino’s government at a time when there were many attempts to destabilize it would calm the situation.

It made no difference. There were more coup attempts, discouraging investments badly needed to create jobs. This was a pity because they had so many able people, educated in the Philippines and the United States. Their workers were English-speaking, at least in Manila. There was no reason why the Philippines should not have been one of the more successful of the ASEAN countries. In the 1950s and 1960s, it was the most developed, because America had been generous in rehabilitating the country after the war. Something was missing, a gel to hold society together. The people at the top, the elite mestizos, had the same detached attitude to the native peasants as the mestizos in their haciendas in Latin America had toward their peons. They were two different societies: Those at the top lived a life of extreme luxury and comfort while the peasants scraped a living, and in the Philippines it was a hard living. They had no land but worked on sugar and coconut plantations.They had many children because the church discouraged birth control. The result was increasing poverty.

It was obvious that the Philippines would never take off unless there was substantial aid from the United States. George Shultz, the secretary of state, was sympathetic and wanted to help but made clear to me that the United States would be better able to do something if ASEAN showed support by making its contribution. The United States was reluctant to go it alone and adopt the Philippines as its special problem. Shultz wanted ASEAN to play a more prominent role to make it easier for the president to get the necessary votes in Congress. I persuaded Shultz to get the aid project off the ground in 1988, before President Reagan’s second term of office ended. He did. There were two meetings for a Multilateral Assistance Initiative (Philippines Assistance Programme): The first in Tokyo in 1989 brought US$3.5 billion in pledges, and the second in Hong Kong in 1991, under the Bush administration, yielded US$14 billion in pledges. But instability in the Philippines did not abate. This made donors hesitant and delayed the implementation of projects.

Mrs. Aquino’s successor, Fidel Ramos, whom she had backed, was more practical and established greater stability. In November 1992, I visited him. In a speech to the 18th Philippine Business Conference, I said, “I do not believe democracy necessarily leads to development. I believe what a country needs to develop is discipline more than democracy.” In private, President Ramos said he agreed with me that British parliamentary-type constitutions worked better because the majority party in the legislature was also the government. Publicly, Ramos had to differ.

He knew well the difficulties of trying to govern with strict American-style separation of powers. The senate had already defeated Mrs. Aquino’s proposal to retain the American bases. The Philippines had a rambunctious press but it did not check corruption. Individual press reporters could be bought, as could many judges. Something had gone seriously wrong. Millions of Filipino men and women had to leave their country for jobs abroad beneath their level of education. Filipino professionals whom we recruited to work in Singapore are as good as our own. Indeed, their architects, artists, and musicians are more artistic and creative than ours. Hundreds of thousands of them have left for Hawaii and for the American mainland. It is a problem the solution to which has not been made easier by the workings of a Philippine version of the American constitution.

The difference lies in the culture of the Filipino people. It is a soft, forgiving culture. Only in the Philippines could a leader like Ferdinand Marcos, who pillaged his country for over 20 years, still be considered for a national burial. Insignificant amounts of the loot have been recovered, yet his wife and children were allowed to return and engage in politics. They supported the winning presidential and congressional candidates with their considerable resources and reappeared in the political and social limelight after the 1998 election that returned President Joseph Estrada. General Fabian Ver, Marcos’s commander-in-chief who had been in charge of security when Aquino was assassinated, had fled the Philippines together with Marcos in 1986. When he died in Bangkok, the Estrada government gave the general military honors at his burial. One Filipino newspaper, Today, wrote on 22 November 1998, “Ver, Marcos and the rest of the official family plunged the country into two decades of lies, torture, and plunder. Over the next decade, Marcos’s cronies and immediate family would tiptoe back into the country, one by one – always to the public’s revulsion and disgust, though they showed that there was nothing that hidden money and thick hides could not withstand.” Some Filipinos write and speak with passion. If they could get their elite to share their sentiments and act, what could they not have achieved?

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SAYANG! kindly share.