ISEF 2012’s ceremony awarding special prizes given by governmental bodies, organizations and enterprises excitingly took place in Pittsburgh, USA.Reportedly, 3 Vietnamese – American students shared 6 prizes.

In 17/5 evening (18/5 in Vietnam), Pittsburgh’s great central hall was crammed with people and 1,500 competitors as well as thousands of friends, relatives, supervisors, judgers, sponsors and reporters.

Right in the first prizes announced was Vanna Nga Hovanky, a Vietnamese – American girl in Texas, with her new initiative of a new cancer therapy. She got the second prize worth 1,000 USD from the Association of Pharmaceutical scientists of the United States.

Right after that, another Vietnamese name was mentioned: it was Kevin Anh Nguyen, also from Texas, with the study in a new kind of suture which can help patients recover more quickly after surgeries. This study honorably won the first prize worth 4,000 USD from the Association of Chemistry of the United States. Kevin also won the second prize worth 1,500 USD from the SIGMA VI scientific association.

Kevin Anh Nguyen - the 3rd person from the right

However, the greatest success that night was Vu Mai Anh, who had made a double shot with 2 special prizes from the Army of the USA and the Association of Chemistry of the United States. Last year, Mai Anh conducted a topic with his cousin, Nguyen Quoc Bao. This year, as Bao had been admitted to university, Mai Anh managed to do everything on her own and raised the topic to a higher level. It was surprising that she won consecutively 3 special prizes: the second prize worth 2,000 USD from NASA, … worth 1,500 USD from the Army of the USA and a 2,500 USD – scholarship from Duquesne University.

Mai Anh showed her greatly moving feelings when she got 3 prizes successively and continually said “unbelievable”; “I did not place any expectation in this year’s award”. Last year, after winning 2 special prizes, Mai Anh also won the first prize in the Chemistry field in the official prize system of ISEF. Nevertheless, when asked to judge her own prospect of winning the official prize the next day, after making a hattrick at the special prize ceremony, Mai Anh still modestly gave no expectations.

Vu Mai Anh(right)

However, it could be seen that the judgers and awarding bodies’ judgments were fairly analogous. Thus, though judging the ratio between the total number of prizes and the total number of competitors is about 5:1, in fact, there were pretty numerous outstanding individuals or teams like Kevin or Mai Anh claiming more than one prize. So, the more special prizes Mai Anh won, the bigger the possibility of winning the official prizes would be.

In conclusion, as the only Vietnamese team got no special prizes that night, the chances of any Vietnamese getting a prize at ISEF are still slender. Looking the the Vietnamese – American talents stepping on the podium of glory, we can assert that the Vietnamese intellectual level is not lower than any nations’; but apparently, there are still a lot to hope from our inner education if we desire to be equal to those mighty countries in a practical, widely influenced and modern competition like ISEF.

Correspondent: Tuan Anh (Dantri.com.vn)

Translator: Tran Hai Anh (A2 11-14)