University of Social Sciences and Humanities - VNU Hanoi

Faculty of Tourism

1. OVERVIEW

The Faculty of Tourism was established by the decision of the President of Vietnam National University-Hanoi on October 21, 1995 to produce Bachelors in tourism, who have both basic knowledge and intensive knowledge in Cultural Tourism, Geographical Tourism, Tourist Economics and Tourist Professional Skills.

Approved by the Ministry of Education and Training and Vietnam National University-Hanoi, the Faculty of Tourism has started providing master program of tourism since 2003 in addition to its undergraduate programs. The Faculty has been the only one that provides master program in tourism in Vietnam so far.

The number of faculty and staff is 17, including 2 Assoc. Professors, 5 PhD holders, and the rest of faculty and staff either has master degrees or pursuing their master and doctoral programs in Vietnam and abroad. The Faculty is now focusing on upgrading faculty and staff’s capacity to meet new demands; increase both the number and the quality of faculty and staff; standardizing faculty and staff to meet specific demands.

Addition to permanent lecturers, the Faculty has invited 20 others from many different universities, colleges, institutions, provincial departments of tourism and Vietnam General Department of Tourism to work as visiting lecturers, to supervise students for their terminal projects and theses.

Despite of its short history, the Faculty of Tourism has recorded some great achievements:

• The Faculty has produced 2000 students in both undergraduate and graduate programs of tourism in Vietnam.
• 20 reference books and textbooks have been published, nearly 100 articles were published on journals and magazines.
• Initiating cooperative relations with many tourist training centers, tourist institutes both in Vietnam and abroad such as China, France, Japan, Korea and Australia.

More than ten years of building and development, the Faculty of Tourism has contributed to providing human resource in tourism for Vietnam. Graduated students have become good professionals at work and many of them have been assigned to important positions in Vietnam General Department of Tourism, Vietnam Association of Tourism, Institute for Tourist Research and Development, provincial departments of tourism all around the country. The Faculty also produced many those who had excellent professional knowledge and are now teaching at different universities, colleges and vocational schools.

The Faculty has been awarded the Certificate of Merit from Vietnam Prime Minister. In addition, the Faculty and its members have been awarded many certificates of merit from Vietnam General Department of Tourism, Hanoi People’ Committee and from President of Vietnam National University-Hanoi.

2. ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURE

• Dean: Assoc.Prof. Tran Thi Minh Hoa. PhD
• Vice-Dean:
  + Trinh Le Anh. MA
  + Nguyen Thu Thuy. MA

Departments

• Department of Cultural and Geographical Tourism
  Head, Assoc. Prof. Nguyen Pham Hung. PhD
  Deputy: Bui Thi Hai Yen. MA
• Department of Economics and Tourist Professional Skills
  Head, Vu Manh Ha. PhD
  Deputy: Nguyen Thi Ngoc Dung. MA

3. TRAINING PROGRAMS

The Faculty is assigned to provide human resources with undergraduate and graduate degrees of tourism and is having four major types of training. Now it is upgrading and transferring its undergraduate program into credit system; improving its training quality on the basis of focusing on each specialty.

• BA program for fulltime students in four years with BA degree in tourism.
• BA program for part-time students in five years with BA degree in tourism.
• MA program for students in three years with MA degree in tourism.
• Short courses in 2 months, 4 months, or 6 months with certificate of completion signed by Vietnam General Department of Tourism.

Additionally, the Faculty has been running some joint training programs with international partners such as Guangxi Institute of Education, China and with domestic partners to upgrade knowledge of those who are working at provincial departments of tourism and many tourist companies nationwide from Ho Chi Minh city, Da Nang, Thua Thien Hue to Quang Ninh, Hai Duong, Son La and Ha Giang. etc.

In the time coming, the Faculty continues strengthening and diversifying types of training programs to meet practical demands; attaching its training programs with social demands of human resource; setting up strategies to cooperate with users of graduated students to meet their needs of human resource. At the same time, it is step by step building and upgrading facilities to serve training and researching activities; preparing to set up a center for professional practice; upgrading the curriculum and materials meeting standardized and modern criteria; expanding and diversifying types of training programs in combination with the improvement of graduate program; preparing a curriculum for doctoral program.

4. RESEARCH PROGRAMS

In order to improve training quality, the Faculty of Tourism pays its much attention to research activities. Even though it is newly established, members of the Faculty have conducted many research projects ranging from ministerial level and Vietnam National University level in the areas of planning tourist development, cultural tourist, ecological tourism, tourist economics. Some of Faculty’s members also took part in several projects of State level. Results of some researches have been published as reference materials and on other domestic and international journals serving faculty and students’ studies.

The Faculty has organized some conferences on tourism in general and on Vietnam’s tourism in the integration and development in particular. It also encourages its students to conduct their researches. Many students have won prizes from the University of Social Sciences and Humanities and Vietnam National University. Students’ projects are closely associated with tourist practical issues and their results became reference materials.

5. INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION

The Faculty has cooperative relations with governmental agencies of tourist management, tourist institutes and other universities and colleges whose have programs of tourism. It also has relations with many provincial departments of tourism, tourist enterprises, tourist companies and hotels nationwide.

The Faculty of Tourism has been in relationship with many international partners such as University of Toulouse II in France, University of Dusit Thanis in Thailand, Guangxi Institute of Education in China. The Faculty has been inviting scholars from the United States, France to teach as visiting professors and receiving international students to study or to do their internships such as students from Laos, Korea and Japan. The Faculty has been training Chinese students in tourism since 2005. And it continues expanding cooperation with partners in Southeast Asia, China and other countries.

6. CONTACT

1st Floor, Building A
University of Social Sciences and Humanities-Hanoi
No. 336, Nguyen Trai St., Thanh Xuan Dist., Hanoi, Vietnam
Tel: (844) 38588591; Email: tourism@yahoo.com