Sustaining The Atlantic Philanthropies’ vision into the next decade

As the Institute of Health and Biomedical Innovation’s founding donor,The Atlantic Philanthropies placed a great deal of faith in Queensland University of Technology (QUT) to create a world-class Institute that focuses its research to make a real and sustainable difference to people’s lives.

Throughout the past decade, while The Atlantic Philanthropies was investing heavily in our infrastructure at Kelvin Grove and Gardens Point, it was also keen to support QUT to develop relationships with partners in Vietnam. Our focus has been on building academic capacity in health professional training and research in several Vietnamese provinces.

The QUT School of Public Health has been continuously supported since 2001 to build effective links, first with the Hanoi School of Public Health and since 2006, with Faculties in Ho Chi Minh City, Hue and Can Tho. Our knowledge transfer work has produced significant improvement in teaching resources across many fields, such as Biostatistics, Epidemiology, Health Information Management and Nutrition.

A key part of this work has been in training the next generation of academics. Under the direct support from The Atlantic Philanthropies, 18 Masters and PhD students have studied in Public Health. They are all now employed in universities and health agencies throughout Vietnam.

According to project leader Professor Michael Dunne, ‘International university linkages are only as strong as the goodwill between people. The founding donor of The Atlantic Philanthropies backed QUT and other Australian universities as development partners for Vietnam because of his belief that Australians, by nature, collaborate well.’

‘Over 10 years, we have been able to establish a solid sense of trust with leaders of many universities and institutes. They are now keen to recommend QUT to their best and brightest.’

‘From 2011–14, we will be working with 10 new PhD students and at least seven Masters students, all supported by AusAID, the Vietnam Government, Endeavour Awards and other agencies,’ Professor Dunne said. The support of The Atlantic Philanthropies has extended to a major focus on developing the nursing profession throughout Vietnam, which includes active engagement by researchers and lecturers from QUT’s School of Nursing and Midwifery.

>Read IHBI Advances newsletter, which focuses on the Institute’s work in Vietnam.

The Queensland University of Technology is an Atlantic grantee.