Nguyen Thi Minh Hoa (born in 1998, from Hai Phong) was the valedictorian of Foreign Trade University in 2020. At that time, Hoa set a record as a graduating student with an absolute GPA of 4.0/4.0. Despite achieving an unprecedented high achievement in the history of the school, the female student from Hai Phong believes that "it is not necessary to bury your head in books" but to make effective and intelligent use of time. During her university years, Hoa also spent a lot of time participating in a number of student competitions, mainly related to the field of Logistics. Through these competitions, Hoa had the opportunity to interact with and solve practical problems of businesses. From her 4th year, the female student took the exam and was accepted into a multinational corporation in the field of import and export of electronic components. "At that time, I wanted to have practical experiences to be more certain about the development direction in the industry and have a long-term orientation for my career," Hoa said.

Nguyen Thi Minh Hoa is the valedictorian of Foreign Trade University in 2020.

Nearly 2 years of working also helped Hoa see the remaining difficulties - which, according to Hoa, "is the ground for me to develop in the industry". Therefore, the girl from Hai Phong decided to continue studying to have enough knowledge and tools to solve these problems. Deciding to study abroad when she had a successful career and a good income, Hoa had to face many struggles. "Graduating from Foreign Trade, I was under a lot of peer pressure. Most of my classmates at that time were team leaders and managers in companies. When I stopped my career to continue studying, I was afraid that I would be slower than my friends". By the summer of 2021, after much hesitation, Hoa decided to quit her job to "slow down". "I wonder if I am following society's standards, having a stable job and getting married at the age of 25-27? Am I forgetting my original dream?" During high school, Hoa was a former English major student at Tran Phu High School for the Gifted. In high school, the female student also dreamed of studying abroad in Europe. But at that time, Hoa's profile was not competitive enough to "apply" for a full scholarship. Therefore, Hoa decided to spend 4 years of university studying and participating in activities to increase the competitiveness of her profile. Thinking about that dream, Hoa decided to quit her job, "gap year" for 1 year to prepare mentally and for her profile. Hoa's trade-off later received worthy results. In 2022, the former Foreign Trade student received 2 full scholarships to study Supply Chain Management at BI Business School (Norway) and Logistics at Delft University of Technology (Netherlands).

Hoa is studying for a master's degree at Delft University of Technology.

Realizing that he lacked a foundation related to technology and engineering - which are tools to solve the problem of optimizing Logistics, Hoa decided to choose the Netherlands, a country that is strongly developed in seaports and logistics. At Delft University of Technology - the top school in this country, Hoa was exposed to "unrelated" knowledge, focusing on technology, engineering, data processing, and engineering. Therefore, in the first semester, Hoa was "shocked" because he could not keep up with the new knowledge and software. "The knowledge was very intensive and too difficult. At that time, I had to slow down many other activities to focus on studying. There were even times when I thought about whether I should stop and look for other opportunities or not." Fortunately, Hoa always had her family's encouragement and support. According to Hoa, those were the biggest motivations for her to overcome that difficult period. To overcome his weaknesses, Hoa made the most of all resources, searching and asking for documents from friends and teachers to supplement his missing knowledge. There were winter days when the Netherlands was cold and dark, Hoa stayed in the library or lab until late at night to do practice exercises and research, then took the bus home. Trying his best to keep up with the class progress, by the end of the first semester, Hoa had caught up with studying in the Netherlands. During his first year of master's degree, Hoa also completed a scientific article published in the Dutch Supply Chain Management Journal. Whether studying at undergraduate or master's level, Hoa always aims to participate in exchange courses abroad to broaden his horizons. Previously, in his third year of university, Hoa won an exchange scholarship from Hannam University (Korea). While studying for his master's degree in the Netherlands, Hoa continued to win an exchange scholarship from Mines Paris School (France). Up to now, Hoa has had the opportunity to travel to more than 10 countries in Europe with part-time jobs and scholarships. According to Hoa, it is not necessary to have abundant finances to be able to study abroad. Up to now, after conquering studying in 4 different countries in the world, both in Asia and Europe and never having to pay tuition fees, Hoa believes that based on his own abilities, he can still achieve opportunities for himself. Currently, Minh Hoa has completed the subjects in the master's program and started working on his thesis. Hoa is expected to graduate in the summer of 2024. The valedictorian of Foreign Trade University plans to stay in the Netherlands to work for 2 years to gain experience and practical solutions at businesses before returning to develop her career in Vietnam, in the field of logistics, especially in sustainable development.

Vietnamnet.vn

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