chengyien

After few rounds of discussion, brainstorming & testing, they pivoted & found an alternative way to execute their concept. The result: a site specific restaging of the community library space + storytelling of children's conflicted encounters with education in rural Vietnam. 👏🏽

Super proud of this team who pushed through till the very end & delivered on their Creative Practice, marking the culmination of their 2- year impact experience project.🎉
Just a few days ago bad news came abt damaged materials while being shipped, huge setback on their plan.

Yet, for these pathways to impact & change to be realised, there must be some stable conditions to allow for & to facilitate that process.
So, I say to my students, it's more important to focus on how to stabilise critical conditions for change to happen!
#theoryofchange

Students often focus only on problem framing and solutioning, but give little attention to the process of getting from 1 pt to the other. Designing solutions becomes simply an exercise in identifying feasible pathways to effect change.

My whiteboard writing is as messy as it gets. But that's nth compared to the messiness of designing & implementing impact projects that simultaneously serve student learning goals & community needs.

Applied Mobilities Migration infrastructures and (Im)mobile lives: interruptions, failures, and repairs. Volume 9, Issue 4 of Applied Mobilities

Our SI on 🧳Migration infrastructures & (Im)mobile lives: interruptions, failures & repairs 🔨 is officially Vol 9 Issue 4 of Applied Mobilities.
💡 Articles all qn the durability/stability of migration infrastructures & focus on moments of breakdown/transformation.
www.tandfonline.com/toc/rapm20/9...

The internationalisation of education and ‘Belt and Road’ student mobilities in Southeast Asia Published in Asian Population Studies (Ahead of Print, 2025)

Free eprints: www.tandfonline.com/eprint/SAIFV...

3️⃣ The unique drivers behind varying patterns of student mobility to different Southeast Asian destinations, including economic initiatives, geopolitical dynamics, cultural affinities, and institutional collaborations.

2️⃣ The heightening educational credentialism in China serves as a significant driver of Chinese student mobilities to Southeast Asia, reflecting the increasing interconnectedness of the regional education market.

We underline 3 key themes:

1️⃣ The emergence of SEA as an international node in the diversifying pathways of Chinese student mobilities is far from being a homogenous space; it instead replicates the hierarchical nature seen current state of international education.

Inside, we consider the internationalisation dynamics in both China & Southeast Asia, & note the diversifying pathways reflecting not only HE's strategic adjustment in response to both domestic pressures & global opportunities, but also broader shift in educational & aspirations in Asian youth.

The internationalisation of education and ‘Belt and Road’ student mobilities in Southeast Asia Published in Asian Population Studies (Ahead of Print, 2025)

The introduction to our special section on 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗿𝗻𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗶𝘀𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗼𝗳 𝗲𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝗮𝗻𝗱 ‘𝗕𝗲𝗹𝘁 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗥𝗼𝗮𝗱’ 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗺𝗼𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 𝗶𝗻 𝗦𝗼𝘂𝘁𝗵𝗲𝗮𝘀𝘁 𝗔𝘀𝗶𝗮 is now online! 🔆

Read on to find out more, and access free eprints!

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

ari.nus.edu.sg/events/educa...

Do you research topics at the nexus of education, mobility & migration, and has something important to say about 𝗴𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿? 🌈

✨ Zachary Howlett, Kris Lee Hyesoo & myself are organising workshop on 𝗚𝗲𝗻𝗱𝗲𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗡𝗲𝘄 𝗘𝗱𝘂𝗰𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹 𝗠𝗼𝗯𝗶𝗹𝗶𝘁𝗶𝗲𝘀 at NUS Asia Research Institute, 24-25 April 2025.

Check our CfP 👉🏼

Even as we briefly shared our interview stories at the dinner table, we're beginning to see the many faces of these extended lives of international students beyond education.

So interesting to see how international education intersects with marriage and family, and where pathways to social mobility crisscross each other in sometimes romantic and irrational but also strategic and instrumental ways.

In this trip we managed to speak with female Vietnamese and Thai students who studied and eventually settled down in China in Nanning, as spouses and parents to children.

We not only did the fieldwork we set out to do, we also were treated extremely well as tourists and guests of Nanning! The hospitality was 👍🏽⭐.

A really fruitful trip to Nanning and Guangxi University — along with Sin Yee and Rin — to reunite with research collaborators, and where we get to meet a team of postgraduate students ever so eager to support all aspects of our trip.

Post-2020 mainland Chinese student mobility to Malaysia: trends and drivers This article outlines the post-2020 trend of substantial increase in applications and enrolments of mainland Chinese students to Malaysia and discusses its key drivers. It argues that this trend is...

This article is part of a special section carrying country reports that discuss BRI's impact on the internationalisation of education in SEA, all to be published in Asian Population Studies.

Malaysia: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Singapore: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

2. We discover new university actors who're proactively building educational linkages in 'off the map' places, using border region to do the work of internationalisation, via quick-to-implement programmes. Such geography & institutional strategy look very different to global universities on the map.

Article's unique insights
1. Our case on Vietnamese language & cultural learning programmes & student mobilities push against BRI research's predominant focus on Chinese language, adding new layer of analysis on BRI's (multiple) language politics & diplomacy.

We observed that these developments are 1. driven largely by language and cultural learning, 2. geographically active in the south of China and north of Vietnam, and 3. sustained by universities' aspirations for internationalisation through quick-to-build regional collaboration.

Shifting axis of educational diplomacy: student mobilities at Vietnam-China borders Vietnam and China have a shared history of collaboration and conflict, with economic interdependence becoming an important pillar in recent decades. China's larger worldwide policy of economic and ...

🍬Free eprints: www.tandfonline.com/eprint/QR8TY...

Speaking of Vietnam, fresh out of the press is a piece I worked on with ​Hao Phuong Phan​ about the BRI creating new opportunities at the Sino-Viet border regions, which are accelerating educational ties and student mobilities that, in turn, recalibrate Vietnam's axis of educational diplomacy.

Seeing the effort and quality that these teams put into their milestone report videos is so heartening. Most of all, it feels great to see students taking ownership, enjoying teamwork & engaging their projects with much thought & rigor.

1 team is surveying Saigon River transport & re-envisioning water commuting 'from below', guided by a wonderful academic/postgrad community at RMIT Vietnam.

⭐Such project & field based learning model not only teaches students valuable lessons, but also teaches *me* through students' experiences.

2 teams are working in Kon Tum with Bahnar people & in Thanh An far down HCMC's southern tip, respectively building a holiday camp concept to stretch Bahnar youths' social exposure & improving learning resource at school library while also refreshing the space to level up its appeal to school kids.

🌱First post!
Teaching in Impact Experience at NUS College meant that I got to work closely with teams of students directing and canvassing projects that seek to benefit/contribute to local communities across Vietnam.