Ha Van Tiep, a successful story of a PhD researcher

Obtaining a PhD degree was only in my dreams

I was born and grew up in a poor farm family of six siblings in Kien Xuong district, Northern province of Thai Binh. Upon finalizing my BSc in forestry, I considered this the highest academic certificate / degree that I would have in my life. I never thought of a higher education, let alone conducting a PhD research abroad. Thus, when I received the PhD degree from the professor, I had mixed feelings, as if I was dreaming because there were so many times I thought of giving up when facing research challenges in the Netherlands.

Challenges faced in the Netherlands

My life in the Netherlands and its challenges now seem a motion picture screening my mind. The greatest challenge I faced was: the difference in learning and teaching approaches between the Vietnamese and the Dutch educational system, for which I had to adapt and familiarize since day one. In 2014, the final year of my four-year research period, I went to the Netherlands to analyze the data and write my dissertation. Prof. Dr. Pieter Zuidema, my daily supervisor, told me that the key point of a study was to obtain knowledge useful for future work, and that the PhD degree could prove my knowledge and skills.
More than once it happened to me that I could not figure out what a population matrix is and how to apply it in data processing. Still, I did not dare and even felt embarrassed to ask my supervisor for his help because he had said to me that he would never teach/give lessons to me, but that instead I had to read and reflect, and that if there was any point that I failed to understand, I should ask him for his clarification.

When writing my thesis, there were numerous times I felt so disheartened upon seeing my draft papers which were reviewed up to ten times with so many red lines and revisions by my supervisor. Difficult questions from my supervisor made me so nervous and worried because it often took me several weeks to read documents and review all my papers. So, with this studying approach, I had to read and to write while my supervisors would remove any inappropriate points/sections and highlighted questions.

What I’ve learnt

With a great effort, I finally overcame all the challenges in my research. I gradually understood research outputs in a matrix, how to process data, to write in academic style and to argue research outcomes in a common context. Until now, the draft papers with my supervisor’s revisions are being carefully kept in drawers as valuable souvenirs of my life.

My experiences and/or lessons-learnt

A great lesson is that researchers should not hesitate to invite professors to visit their research site and experiment plots. For many researchers, they may not feel at ease when going to the field with their supervisors. However, from my experience, working with my supervisor in the field gave me the chance to show him my real study conditions. It also helped me to find out what and where the problems in my research were for timely interventions and solutions.

I invited my supervisor to Viet Nam twice. As far as I remembered, in 2013, I went with him to the field in Nam Dong district, Central province of Thua Thien Hue. I explained to him the way I set up my experiments, showed him the way I measured trees, while he instantly raised questions regarding why I did it in this way and not in another way, and asked which methods I used for measuring and recording data. He also double-checked the data accuracy, for instance he asked me to measure the diameter of a selected tree and say out loud the figures, and then asked an accompanying student to do the same task to get the data and compare the two. He particularly insisted on the logical arrangements and data accuracy in the research. Thanks to his field visits, I gained substantial confidence towards setting up a research experiment.

For me, what I have obtained today is a reflection from all of my endless efforts in the past. In addition, I was lucky to be instructed and advised by my supervisor; to be given enthusiastic help from international friends; timely support from TBI’s offices in Viet Nam and Wageningen; as well as unconditional love and big encouragement from my family. In short, being successful during a PhD research is not too difficult if we are determined, have a strong will and of course some luck.

Ha Van Tiep