Đồng Thị Bích Thuỷ

Đồng Thị Bích Thuỷ (1954 –2017) was a professor of management informatics who is considered one of the pioneers of the use of informatics in Vietnam. She was a member of the Tenth National Assembly of Vietnam.

Early life and education Đồng Thị Bích Thuỷ was born on 10 December 1954 in Phú Vang district, in the Thừa Thiên Huế province of Vietnam. She graduated in business administration from the University of Lausanne in Switzerland in 1975 and obtained a PhD in management informatics from the University of Geneva in Switzerland in 1986, defending a thesis on information systems and financial informatics databases.

Career Đồng Thị Bích Thuỷ started teaching in 1986 as head of the Information Systems Department at the Ho Chi Minh City University of Science (formerly the University of Natural Sciences). Initially, she found it difficult to get a job because businesses were suspicious of people with a PhD, particularly women, and because few had given any consideration to the need for informatics. Those who had studied information technology (IT) knew how to programme but were failing to take the needs of management into consideration, resulting in managers having to tailor their work to the needs of the IT, rather than the other way round. In 1991 she was the only teacher of the first graduate courses in informatics, until the university had more staff with PhD qualifications. From 1995 to 1999 she was the vice dean of the IT Department and the head of the Information Systems Department. In 1997, she was asked to represent intellectuals in the science and technology sector as a member of the Tenth National Assembly (1997-2002). At the beginning of 2002, she became the vice chancellor of the University of Science and Technology, holding this position until 2007. Despite this management responsibility, she continued to publish widely.

In addition to her expertise in IT, she was also very interested in innovating teaching and learning methods at the university level. In 2007, she and the management board of the Ho Chi Minh City University of Science established the Centre for Research on Improvement of University Teaching and Learning Methods together with Portland State University in Oregon, US. This was the first organization in Vietnam aiming to help support teachers and students in the teaching and learning process. She and her colleagues were the first people to introduce the concept of service-learning to Vietnam. She held the position of director until her death. From 2013 to 2017 she was also a training advisor at the John von Neumann Institute at the Vietnam National University, Ho Chi Minh City.

Personal life Đồng Thị Bích Thuỷ married Lương Văn Lý, former deputy director of the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Department of Planning and Investment of Ho Chi Minh City. They had two daughters.