An e-learning class organized by TOPICA.

“On a business trip or at a cafe, or anywhere the Internet and computers are available, I can listen to my lectures and discuss them with teachers and friends,” Tran Thi Viet Ha said.

What makes the two-year course so interesting is that Ha’s teachers, several of whom are businesspeople, often use real-life situations to get their point across.

“Real examples help us understand the lessons quicker, and we can watch the same lectures as many times as we want,” she told Thanh Nien Weekly.

Like Ha, many students and employees are taking the course to learn things that universities don’t teach.

Some 1,900 students and 105 entrepreneurs have registered for the “1,000 Businesspeople Share Their Experience with Youth via E-learning” study program co-organized by TOPICA, the Vietnam Youth Association and the Vietnam Young Entrepreneurs Association.

Over the next two years, the program is expected to train 30,000 students and 1,000 businesspeople.

Multilateral benefits

Tran Thi Phuong Thao, a student at Hanoi Open University, took the program’s “Skills for a Successful Interview” course. With their practical bent, she found that the lectures and learner forums honed her thinking and her ability to solve situational problems.

Nguyen Manh Cuong, vice president and general secretary of the Vietnam Young Entrepreneurs Association, said the program gave learners the chance for direct contact with managers and thereby improved their employment prospects.

E-learning gives more training options for busy people who cannot attend traditional classes, said TOPICA’s director, Pham Minh Tuan.

The businesspeople who teach in the E-learning programs have helped learners improve their working skills and given them practical experience, Tuan said.

In this way, they “contribute to increasing the quality of human resources, instead of waiting for universities to reform their teaching programs, to create products suitable to the demand,” he said.

“Participating in the program is the implementation of firm’s social responsibility,” said Dao Trong Khang, chairman and director of personnel management consulting firm DTK, and one of the TOPICA program’s teachers.

“I have shared all my experience from 13 years as an employer in the hope that the learners will be more methodical in their job interviews, and more successful,” he said.

Khang said the program gave him more opportunities to share his experience with colleagues in the program while also improve his presentation, listening and summing up skills and expanding his firm’s operational network.

He said the communication with youth had renewed his zest for his work.

First 3D online bachelor’s course

TOPICA, Vietnam’s first bachelor training program using three-dimensional virtual world (second life) technology, creates a lively learning environment like a normal university.

The technology lets learners follow lessons more easily, Tuan from TOPICA said.

For example, learners studying macroeconomics can become traders in the virtual world and recognize real changes in supply and demand that theory alone cannot teach.

The program lets learners connect to companies and get practical experience, as businesspeople teach over 80 percent of the subjects.

At present TOPICA is training over 1,000 students in business administration, finance, accounting and information technology in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. They meet their teachers offline once a month.

Graduates will get bachelor’s certificates from Hanoi Open University, and be able to take local and foreign learning programs to obtain master’s or doctoral degrees.

Reported by Bao Anh