# 02 An educational milestone that empowers your future career in an international organization
After graduation, I applied to the Asian Development Bank Institute, which is one of the world’s leading international development policy think tanks. ADBI provides research and training capacity for policy makers of the Asian Development Bank’s member countries. As a Capacity Building and Training Associate, my responsibilities include assisting in organizing capacity building programs and implementing empirical research on prioritized development topics, which exactly fit my professional aims. Back then when I was in Viet Nam, I had a desire to work in an international organization promoting development-related and sustainability issues. To pursue my dreams, I decided to study in Japan and among the universities offering programs in English, I chose to study in IUJ’s International Development Program. The IDP was the hardest program but the most rewarding journey for me. While preparing for my master’s thesis, I could develop my research skills including collecting, compiling and analyzing data using STATA. My thesis paper was successfully published in the journal “Sustainability”. This thesis publication became a reality thanks to the continuous support of my respected supervisor, Professor Chun Yee Wong, for her untiring invaluable guidance and
her immense knowledge and experience, which inspired me to become a researcher like her. Her courses, including Econometrics and Cross-Sectional and Panel Data Analysis, were beneficial in conducting economics and quantitative research on policy-related issues. I was lucky enough to become her supervisee, then a part-time research assistant at IUJ and I am now luckier to continue to collaborate with her on a health-related paper. IUJ’s academic life did not disappoint me at all. Despite being far from busy cities, living and studying in a rural area of Niigata was a fulfilling experience. I could participate in various cultural, musical, sports, and cooking events on and off campus with friends who were high-level government officials and senior-level employees. I was the Student Representative, Head of the Lean-In Club, which could allow me to interact closely with other friends and develop my interpersonal skills. What I have learned from my valuable learning journey at IUJ was not only academic knowledge obtained from the IDP program, interpersonal skills from extracurricular activities but a professional career that led me to ADBI.
Nguyen Thi Thu Nghia (Viet Nam) Asian Development Bank Institute IDP, Class of 2021
5
Alumni Voice
Made with FlippingBook Converter PDF to HTML5