Engineering student takes out international honours

Nghia Nugyen Trong (centre), flanked by the Governor, Rear Admiral Kevin Scarce, and Mr Bill Spurr, Chair of Education Adelaide.
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Monday, 15 October 2012

Vietnamese engineering student Nghia Nguyen Trong has been named South Australia's International Student of the Year by StudyAdelaide.

Nghia, who is in his third year of a Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical and Electronic) degree, received his award from the SA Governor, Rear Admiral Kevin Scarce AC CSR RANR, on Friday 12 October at an awards ceremony at Government House.

Nghia, from Vietnam's Dak Lak province, also won the Undergraduate Award for Academic Excellence.

He won the International Student of the Year prize from six other category winners in the areas of academia, community engagement, the arts and sports.

Nghia's almost flawless academic record includes high distinctions for all eight subjects he has studied in the past two semesters.

Associate Dean (International) in the Faculty of Engineering, Computer and Mathematical Sciences, Dr Brian Ng, described Nghia as "one of the most remarkable students" in the engineering program.

"He is as humble as he is smart. On top of maintaining exceptional grades, Nghia has been working with a researcher within our School on a side project, and we very much hope to see this work blossom into an exciting research project for the future," Dr Ng said.

Nghia's main area of interest is electromagnetics and in 2011 he won the prestigious IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques Society International Scholarship to support projects in this area. Only 10 of these are given out annually on a worldwide basis.

The Postgraduate Award for Academic Excellence was taken out by University of Adelaide student Wing Yee Ho from Hong Kong, who is studying a PhD in Marketing.

Wing completed her Bachelor of Commerce degree at the University of Adelaide in 2009 and was awarded the Commerce Prize for Marketing. She went on to achieve a First Class Honours degree, winning the University Medal and the Bernie Mills Medal.

Vishal Jodhami, an Indian student undertaking his Masters in Innovation and Entrepreneurship, was highly commended in the postgraduate section for Academic Excellence.

Vishal won second prize at the University of Adelaide's ZEN eChallenge in 2011 and plans to set up his own consulting business on completion of his degree.

The awards ceremony was part of the SA Governor's annual farewell for international students, held last Friday in the grounds of Government House.

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