Being proud of tradition, firmly reaching out

Yesterday (November 26), provincial People's Committee solemnly held a ceremony to celebrate the 120^th founding anniversary of Binh Duong Fine Arts - Culture Junior College (1901-2021). The event was attended by Nguyen Loc Ha, member of provincial Standing Party Committee, Vice-Chairman of provincial People's Committee; Truong Thi Bich Hanh, member of provincial Standing Party Committee, Head of provincial Party Committee’s Commission for Propaganda and Education together with former leaders, teachers and staff of the school over periods.

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At this meaningful event, we met many administrators and teachers who have been with this 120-year-old school for many years. Returning to the old school after many years of separation, staff and teachers who used to teach and study here brought many indescribable emotions. The teachers sadly recalled the years of hard work instilling passion for generations of students.

Generations of the school’s administrators, teachers, and students meet at the event

Le Thanh Tung, former Principal of Binh Duong Fine Arts and Culture Junior College recalled that he entered this school to study when being 14-15 years old. After graduating, he had time to work in another unit and then continued studying at a higher level. After that, he returned to the school to teach, and then worked as a managerial cadre here for many years. Returning to the school this time, he was very touched to see that his art works winning national art prizes were still kept in the school's traditional room.

Over the past 120 years, many teachers studied and devoted their efforts and wisdom to the development of the school. Among them, there was Pham Van Ngan, former Vice-Principal of the school. Or, Nguyen Thanh Tam, Head of the school’s wood design department, with his enthusiasm and dedication to the profession, he has developed the wood department, training students who have solid skills and are useful for the society.

Le Quang Loi, Vice-Principal of the school said that the school has built up a contingent of qualified teachers, officers and staff. The school has trained thousands of students into excellent citizens for the home.

Building brand name

Binh Duong Fine Arts and Culture Junior College (formerly called Thu Dau Mot Native Fine Arts School) is one of the earliest established Fine Arts schools in Indochina by the French in 1901. After over 120 years of development, the school has changed its name many times to suit its history and development as well as opening more training courses to meet the needs of the society. The school trained special skills with fine arts, so provincial People's Committee signed a decision to change the name of the school into Binh Duong Fine Arts Junior College in October 2007. In August 2012, provincial People's Committee merged two schools, namely Fine Arts Junior college and Culture, Arts and Tourism Junior College, into Binh Duong Fine Arts and Culture Junior College.

Since its establishment, the school has made efforts in vocational training from scientific theory to practice, contributing to establishing a formal training system in fine arts. The school has trained many classes of skilled artisans, with knowledge of aesthetic culture, making practical contributions to socio-economic and cultural fields at home and abroad.

With a history of 120 years, the school has built a brand of applied art training on the premise of local traditional crafts such as lacquer, wood carving, sculpture, pottery, applied art... With contributions to the cause of education - training and vocational education, Binh Duong Fine Arts - Culture Junior College was awarded the third-class Labor Medal by the State President in 2017. In 2021, the school has also awarded the certificate of merit by the Prime Minister together with many certificates of merit and emulation banners from provincial People's Committee. For development orientations, the school has set out the mission of "Preservation of heritages – conversation of traditions - vocational training - promotion of creativity - development of education".

The school’s training orientation in the future is to further maintain and develop skills through expanding its enrollment scale as well as increasing training equipment. In addition, the school will expand propaganda about the school's skills to people and students to participate in vocational training. In particular, the school will focus on training applied arts, training skilled workers who can participate in the production process at enterprises in the near future.

The school also aims at training in association with enterprises ‘demand through training programs taken from the practical basis of enterprises to match their production process, creating products that meet the needs of the society. In addition, the school will also coordinate with all-level authorities, sectors and industries ‘associations to continue expanding skills and supply skilled laborers for enterprises in the province in the near future.

Nguyen Loc Ha, member of provincial Party Standing Committee, Vice-Chairman of provincial People's Committee: We are proud of the 120-year-old school with a great brand established, so the preservation and development of the school are important tasks that the school’s generation of teachers and teachers today must perform. The school should aim at becoming a leading vocational education institution in the field of cultural and artistic training at present; training qualified and high-quality human resources, serving the cause of national industrialization and modernization, thereby gradually improving the quality of vocational education towards modernity, approaching advanced vocational education in the region and in the world.

Within the framework of activities to celebrate its 120th anniversary, Binh Duong Fine Arts and Culture Junior College held a fine art exhibition at its gallery and campus with 40 paintings, 40 sculptures, 6 relieves, 40 children's paintings. Among them, there are many art works winning national, regional art awards and awards of provincial Literature-Arts Association from the school's teachers

Reported by Anh Sang-Translated by Kim Tin