One of Vietnam’s prominent retail interior designers Luu Viet Thang who is renowned for creating store fixtures and outlets for major international brands credits his current success to the two year scholarship he was awarded by UNIS Hanoi.

Unknown to many, Thang, together with his cousin Tu Anh and another local teen, named Thach, became UNIS Hanoi’s very first Vietnamese students.

On a trial two year scholarship programme, the trio joined UNIS Hanoi as middle schoolers, back in 1992. 

Thang, who heads up Hexagon, a company with 400 staff and multiple offices across Vietnam, recalled, “Studying at UNIS Hanoi changed my life. I was going to a local school when my uncle, who worked with UNICEF, told my school that UNIS Hanoi was offering scholarships. I remember sitting a lot of exams and meeting the Head of School, Graham Cherry, not really knowing what this opportunity meant.”

Pleased to have passed the rigorous tests, Thang, Tu Anh and Thach became a part of the UNIS Hanoi community during the middle of the school year. And the three loved the experience, he shared. He added, “Everyone made us feel very welcome and I remember we were invited to all the parties. They used to also have some parties at a restaurant where the burger was USD2.00 and we couldn’t afford it. That was a lot of money to us at the time. But when the teachers and students realised we weren’t joining those parties because of the cost, they started covering the cost for us. We were very much a part of the School. It was a special time.”

Thang recalls how some teachers went the extra mile. He said, “An Australian teacher called Sara Smith, whom I’m still in touch with, would often invite me to her house for dinner or to play with her children. And just last year I met up with her daughter, Emily, in Cambodia where she is working.”

Although Thang, Tu Anh and Thach were students at UNIS Hanoi for just two years, Thang says that learning in English as well as benefiting from a different teaching method left a lasting impact. He explains, “In Vietnamese schools, you learn to memorize information. At UNIS Hanoi, we learnt to explore and understand what we were being taught.”

Thang remembers Chemistry being his favourite subject. “I loved to experiment” he revealed. “I liked having fun. That was the difference between my experience and that of my cousin Tu Anh; I was playing, she was studying.”

Thang, who is also a Vice Dean of the Faculty of Interior and Exterior Design at the University of Industrial Fine Art of Hanoi, reported how his cousin continued to be studious, achieving a law degree decades later. “She’s now a successful international lawyer based in the UK.”

According to records, the one-of-a-kind scholarship programme was initiated exclusively by the Board of UNIS Hanoi at the time. Very few details exist but what has remained is the remarkable impact the scheme made on three once unknown recipients.