University grants full scholarship to Olympic Informatics gold medalist

Photo: ntcc

Candidates who won gold medals in informatics and silver medals in international mathematics both chose computer science .

On the evening of August 9, Master Hoang Thanh Tu, Deputy Head of the Information and Communication Department of the University of Natural Sciences, Ho Chi Minh City, said that Le Kien Thanh, the gold medalist of the 2025 International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI), a student of Le Quy Don High School for the Gifted, Gia Lai Province (Quy Nhon City, former Binh Dinh Province), had registered his first choice for the advanced program of the Faculty of Information Technology at this school. The school decided to grant a full scholarship worth nearly 300 million VND to this candidate after being admitted and enrolled.

Master Tu also said that silver medalist of the International Mathematical Olympiad Le Phan Duc Man, a student of Le Hong Phong High School for the Gifted, Ho Chi Minh City, also registered his first choice for the advanced program of computer science at the University of Natural Sciences, Ho Chi Minh City.

Master Hoang Thanh Tu said that Le Kien Thanh and Le Phan Duc Man were admitted to the school through direct admission according to the admission regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training. In which, Le Kien Thanh was admitted based on the first prize in the national excellent student exam in information technology. Le Phan Duc Man was admitted to the school based on the second prize in the national excellent student exam in mathematics. These candidates had placed their wish for an advanced program in computer science on the Ministry of Education and Training's common admission system before participating in the International Olympics.

The school of many national and international awards

Earlier, on the morning of August 2, the official results of the 2025 International Olympiad in Informatics (IOI) were announced on the Organizing Committee's website. The Vietnamese team achieved high results with 1 gold medal, 2 silver medals and 1 bronze medal. Of which, Le Kien Thanh was the only member of the Vietnamese team to win a gold medal. Le Kien Thanh also made his mark with a silver medal at the 2025 Asia- Pacific Olympiad in Informatics (APIO) hosted by Uzbekistan on May 17-18.

Le Kien Thanh is a familiar name among IT students. Since he was in 10th grade, Thanh won first prize in the provincial IT competition (for 12th graders) and won second prize in the national IT competition in 2023. In the same year, he was also crowned champion at the Le Quy Don Online Judge Cup 2023 in Da Nang City and won first prize in group C1 at the National Youth IT Competition.

With a series of impressive achievements, Le Kien Thanh has been awarded certificates of merit many times by the Minister of Education and Training and the People's Committee of Binh Dinh province (now merged with Gia Lai province). The Central Committee of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union also awarded him the Creative Youth Badge. Recently, Le Kien Thanh was one of five outstanding delegates of Binh Dinh province (old) selected to attend the 8th National Congress of Advanced Youth Following Uncle Ho's Teachings.

Photo: Vu Doan

Le Phan Duc Man is the only representative of Ho Chi Minh City and the southern provinces selected to be on the team representing Vietnam to participate in the International Mathematical Olympiad in 2025. Le Phan Duc Man and 5 other students participated in the International Mathematical Olympiad - IMO 2025 held in Australia from July 10 to 20. Le Phan Duc Man won a silver medal with 28/42. Previously, in grade 11, this male student won third prize in the city-level math competition, and in grade 12, he won second prize in the national math competition.

Previously, Trinh Hoang Trieu (a former student of Le Quy Don High School for the Gifted, former Binh Dinh) also chose the University of Natural Sciences in 2013, chose to study and graduated from the advanced program with a thesis with a perfect score. During his university studies, Trieu participated in internships at technology companies in Canada, Japan and joined Google at the age of 22. Completing his doctoral thesis at New York University, Trinh Hoang Trieu is the main author of AlphaGeometry - an AI tool that solved 25 Olympic geometry problems, published in Nature magazine and praised by the New York Times .

According to Master Hoang Thanh Tu, the advanced computer science program of the University of Natural Sciences in Ho Chi Minh City is where many candidates who have won national and international awards register to study every year. This is the major with the largest number of candidates registering for direct admission and priority admission according to the admission regulations of the Ministry of Education and Training.