PARIS (VNA) – Vietnamese alumni of the National Institute of Applied Sciences Center Val de Loire (INSA Blois), the recipients of the Rencontres du Vietnam – Vallet (RVN-Vallet) grant, met in Blois on Thursday, May 26 , France as part of the conferences of the Rencontres de Blois.
Vietnamese Ambassador to France Dinh Toan Thang welcomed the contributions of Professor Trân Thanh Vân and his wife, Professor Kim Ngoc, to the establishment and operation of the RVN Vallet Scholarship Fund which has helped create opportunities for many underprivileged but brilliant Vietnamese students to advance on the path of knowledge and science.
He expressed his hope that the scholarship fund and RVN organization will provide Vietnamese students with more opportunities to showcase their talents and contribute to national development, especially in science and technology.
The RVN Vallet Scholars spoke about their learning and working process in France and thanked Professor Trân Thanh Vân, his French colleague Professor Odon Vallet and the RVN organization for their support.
In 1993, Professor Trân Thanh Vân and his wife returned to Vietnam to organize the first RVN program, which attracted hundreds of famous physicists from around the world. A year later, on her initiative, the RVN Scholarship Fund was established with the aim of promoting and supporting young talents who are excellent students of Vietnam, especially those who are disadvantaged or come from ethnic or remote regions.
At a grant award ceremony in 2000, Sorbonne University history and religion professor Odon Vallet expressed his desire to contribute to this grant fund along with Professor Trân Thanh Vân. Touched by this gesture, Professor Trân Thanh Vân decided to rename the fund to RVN-Vallet.
RVN-Vallet has been the largest non-governmental scholarship fund for more than 20 years and also the longest operating in Vietnam. To date, it has awarded nearly 40,000 scholarships worth more than VND350 billion (US$15 million) to students and young researchers in Vietnam. – VNA