UTC junior Vinny Nguyen awarded Boren Scholarship to study in Vietnam

UTC junior Vinny Nguyen was one of three students nationwide selected to study in Vietnam as a 2025 Boren Scholarship recipient. Photo by Angela Foster.

For the second consecutive year, a University of Tennessee at Chattanooga student has been named a recipient of the highly competitive David L. Boren Scholarship, an award designed to strengthen critical language skills and advance U.S. national security interests.

Vinny Nguyen, a junior double majoring in political science: international/comparative studies and economics: international public policy, with a minor in Asian studies, was selected to receive the Boren Scholarship to study in Vietnam.

Nguyen, also a member of the Innovations in Honors program in the UTC Honors College, will be traveling back overseas in October for the six-month program after spending this summer studying Mandarin at Tamkang University in Taiwan on a Critical Language Scholarship (CLS).

He follows Emma Roy, a UTC secondary education: political science major and Brock Scholar, who spent the 2024-25 academic year in Taiwan as a Boren Scholarship recipient.

Administered through the U.S. Department of Defense, the Boren Scholarship supports students pursuing intensive language study and cultural immersion in regions deemed vital to U.S. interests. By focusing on areas of the world often underrepresented in study abroad programs, the initiative prepares students for future roles in international diplomacy, security and service.

Nguyen was one of three students nationwide selected to study in Vietnam.

“I didn’t expect it,” he said of receiving the Boren award while still in the midst of his Taiwan studies. “I woke up and saw the email, ‘Congratulations on your Boren Award.’ The first thing I did was call my mom.”

Nguyen will spend 25 weeks in Vietnam for the immersive study experience, with plans to travel throughout the northern, central and southern regions of the country.

“It’s exciting,” said Dr. Trey Straussberger, director of the UTC Office of National Scholarships. “The Boren is meant to train the next generation of leaders in American diplomacy, especially in languages that are critical to advance American interests abroad.

“I think this will advance Vinny’s intention to serve in the foreign service later on, but it’s also a homecoming.”

Vinny Nguyen will be traveling to Vietnam in October for the six-month Boren program after spending this summer studying Mandarin at Tamkang University in Taiwan on a Critical Language Scholarship.

Nguyen, who was born in Chattanooga in 2004 and graduated from Lookout Valley High School in 2022, said his father emigrated from Vietnam in 1995 and his mother in 2002.

While he grew up speaking Vietnamese at home, he has not visited the country since 2013.

“It was also a personal thing for me to apply for the Boren to Vietnam because I’m a heritage speaker; my parents are from Ho Chi Minh City in southern Vietnam,” he said. “Even though I’m a heritage speaker, my Vietnamese is somewhat limited because it’s just at-home Vietnamese.

“I want to grow it more professionally and be able to use more sophisticated terminology, especially if I want to use it in diplomatic work.”

Nguyen’s long-term goal is to pursue a career in foreign service and Asian affairs, and he sees the Boren as a next step.

“I want more hands-on work—actual diplomacy work experience—and to be able to work with policy or with actual government officials,” he said. “I’ve really only engaged with that from the academic side, reading about it in papers and articles. But I want to be there. I want to be in the room and be able to talk to those kinds of people and see how they make the decisions they make.”

The Boren Scholarship requires a one-year federal service commitment following graduation, which Straussberger describes as a long-term investment.

“Because the Boren requires students who are awarded the scholarship to serve in the federal government, it’s called a service year,” he said. “Awards like the Boren are an investment in America’s future—that we are investing in our young future leaders to build the skills they will need later on to advance American interests, both in the United States and abroad.”

Nguyen said his time in Taiwan with the CLS has further shaped his path.

“The CLS program has taught me a lot,” he said. “It’s intense and it’s intended to be, but it’s manageable. I’ve grown really close with my CLS cohort here in New Taipei City.

“Taiwan is great. It is a beautiful country. There’s a lot of nature, and I’ve eaten a lot of good food—night market food, stuff I hadn’t tried before. It’s a really cool experience and I’ve grown a lot in my language skills. I also learned a lot about the Taiwanese culture through my host family.”

Straussberger hopes journeys like Nguyen’s will inspire more UTC students to apply for national awards.

“I think some students might think that they’re not competitive applicants for these nationally competitive awards,” Straussberger said. “But the more students can see that their peers are winning these awards and going abroad and having these impactful experiences, that incentivizes them to apply themselves.

“The more we win awards like the Boren or Fulbright year after year, the more students will hear about these opportunities and think, ‘This is a possibility for me.’”