Former U.S.
Senator's appt as chair of Fulbright University VN’s Board of Trustees stirs
interest
After President
Barack Obama's visit to Vietnam, where he lifted an arms embargo on Vietnam
and expressed his support for the establishment of FUV, the public was
intrigued about the news that former Senator Bob Kerrey (who was involved in
the raid in Thanh Phong village, Ben Tre province in 1969) was appointed the
Chair of FUV Board of Trustees.
VietNamNet
talked with Bob Kerrey and Thomas J. Valelly, Chairman of the Trust for
University Innovation in Vietnam (TUIV), about the issue.
Q: In his
remarks to a gathering of Vietnamese young people in HCM City on May 25,
President Obama thanked you for being one of the key people to lead the establishment
of the FUV. How did you get involved in this project?
Former Senator Bob Kerry
Bob Kerrey: That is a long story. I suppose the origins
of my involvement date back to 1991, when I helped re-establish the Fulbright
Exchange Program with Vietnam.
Several
years after that we launched the Fulbright Economics Teaching Program in Ho
Chi Minh City, also with Fulbright funding.
Later on, I
sponsored the legislation that allocated debt repayments from the government
of Vietnam to the US government to create the Vietnam Education Foundation.
While I was
president of The New School, I participated in two studies of Vietnamese
higher education for the Ministry of Education and Training.
One of our
papers dealt with Vietnam’s ambition to build a world-class university. The
FUV concept was influenced by that work.
In
2013, I participated in a roundtable discussion with then-President Truong
Tan Sang and Minister of Education and Training Pham Vu Luan where a roadmap
for creating FUV emerged.
Over the
past several years I have worked to secure funding from the US government for
FUV. Last year, Congress passed legislation that will make $17.5 million
available to the project over several years.
I hope that
the US government will continue to support FUV financially in future years.
We are also working raise money from private donors, in part in order to fund
scholarships for FUV students.
Q: Why did
you accept the invitation to serve as Chairman of the FUV Board of Trustees,
a decision that I am sure you could anticipate could cause controversy?
Bob Kerrey: I was asked to serve as chairman at a
dinner with FUV’s president, Dam BichThuy, and others to discuss the
formation of the board. This title, I believe it is fair to say, means much
more in Vietnam than it does in the US, where the title refers to the person
who has the lead in raising money for the President.
I gave it a
lot of thought before accepting the invitation and it was still a difficult
decision. The pain of my memories remains with me. We must face the past
honestly even when it hurts. But we should not live in the past. The future
is all we have.
My wish is
to help Vietnam achieve its ambition of building an exceptional university
that can add economic and cultural value to the country.
I vividly
recall my first meeting with Ms. Dam BichThuy, the Vietnamese woman who is
FUV’s first president. She was born and raised in Hanoi. She remembers the
war. She remembers the Christmas Bombings. She remembers the destruction and
devastation of that period. But she doesn’t hate us. She considers us her
friends and colleagues. I will work as hard as I can to live up to her
confidence in me.
Q: As
chairman of the FUV Board of Trustees, what will you contribute to this
highly anticipated project?
Bob Kerrey: First of all, I want to emphasize this:
Fulbright University Vietnam initiative is being led by Vietnamese. The
president and a majority of the board are Vietnamese; they will ensure that
FUV cultivates Vietnamese traditions. The participation of myself and the
other Americans who are involved is intended to help our Vietnamese
colleagues succeed.
In my role
as Chairman of the FUV Board of Trustees, I will give my total support to the
president and the university’s Vietnamese leadership in order to build a true
center of teaching excellence. Fundraising is of course a top priority. We
need to build a campus, provide scholarships to students, and help FUV
achieve financial stability.
With a new
university, there are opportunities to do things differently. Have you ever
heard of the Minerva Project? I am involved in this initiative. Minerva is
without precedent in American higher education. It was established in 2012
but is already attracting more than 15,000 applications a year, while
admitting just 300.
Most
importantly, Minerva is committed to keeping tuition as low as possible. The
school currently charges US$10,000 per year, which is $30-50,000 cheaper than
other top- and mid-tier US colleges and universities.
Clearly,
providing high quality teaching programs that meet the demands of the labor
market at the lowest possible price is a challenge for higher education
around the world, not just in Vietnam. FUV’s leadership will need to take
this on.
I hope to
help connect FUV both with the resources it needs to develop as well as with
visionary partners who share our vision for seeing FUV join the ranks of the
world’s leading centers of higher learning.
Q: As you
have already said, accepting the invitation to join the FUV meant confronting
the past again. What would you like to say to the Vietnamese people?
Bob Kerrey: My actions in Vietnam were terrible and
have, I believe, been fully examined. It was not My Lai. However, as the soon
to be aired documentary will show: our tactics were responsible for at least
a million innocent deaths. I have apologized to the Vietnamese people
for my actions during the war and I do so again now. Sincerely and with the
pain of that memory with me forever I apologize to the people I have hurt.
But an
apology has always felt insufficient. It is like fish soup without the
fish. And so I have tried to help the Vietnamese people when I
can. By being a part of the effort to end the trading with the enemy
act, normalizing relations, supporting expanded bilateral trade and aid, and
especially supporting efforts to improve Vietnam's educational system through
the Fulbright program.
Q: Given
your personal history, did you anticipate that there would be people who
believe you are not an appropriate choice to lead the FUV?
Bob Kerrey: I did not expect but am not surprised that
this is controversial. Opting for a lesser position would probably still have
provoked criticism. Making peace is hard, precisely because memories are
never as clear as our emotions.
The great
Irish poet Seamus Heaney described this well in "The Cure At Troy":
"Human
beings torture one another
They get
hurt and get hard
No poem,
play or song
Can ever
right a wrong
Inflicted
and endured."
We cannot
change the past I am afraid. We can only change the future even when it hurts
to do so.
Minh
Chau – Ha Anh – Thu Ha, VNN
|
Thứ Năm, 2 tháng 6, 2016
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