AI FOR GOOD

My journey with AI for good began not in a lab or at a conference, but in our dining room, during an argument with my mom.

She had just returned from her university class. One of the students, she said, never listened in class. Instead, he went home, downloaded the materials, and used AI to study. To her, this was dangerous, because it is proof that AI made students dependent, careless, and dismissive of real learning.

I pushed back. What if the student simply didn’t connect with the teacher’s way of explaining? What if he couldn’t understand things in class and decide to use his time more efficiently instead? Because I had faced the same problem with one of my teachers at school, and I had made a very similar decision. To me, his choice wasn’t necessarily laziness: it could be a form of self-directed learning, where AI filled the gap left by the classroom. I was proud of winning the argument on logical grounds, but her story stayed with me. If AI could already replace a teacher’s explanation in a university class, then maybe the real question wasn’t whether students should change, but whether teachers, and education systems, needed to evolve. Instead of competing with AI, could they integrate it into teaching, guiding students to dig deeper rather than letting AI do the work for them?

INTERNSHIP AT FPT

This question became more than a debate topic when I interned at FPT Smart Cloud, working on a joint project with FPT Education to design an AI-driven flipped classroom model. The idea sounded perfect at first: students would prepare theory at home with AI, then come to class for practice and discussion. That way, homework couldn’t simply be outsourced to AI because it became classwork.

But execution revealed cracks. FPT Education suggested giving each teacher a set of prompts (written by FPT Smart Cloud) so they could build their own GPTs to generate worksheets. My concern was immediate: if students received AI-generated worksheets, what would stop them from feeding those back into AI to get instant answers? Even though it does lighten the work, that was simply outsourcing on both sides. That wasn’t deeper learning.
After I raised this concern, an alternative was proposed: a platform where students must chat with AI, ask questions, and demonstrate their engagement. Teachers could then see not just whether students had “done the work,” but whether they had explored, probed, and understood. It wasn’t perfect, but it was closer to the vision of AI as a tool for curiosity rather than a shortcut.

Greenwich University's TEDx

I carried this exploration into Greenwich University’s TEDx, where I spoke on the theme Boon or Bane: You Decide. My talk framed AI as a catalyst for lifelong learning. I argued that AI could act both as a competitor, by pushing students to raise their standards in fear of being replaced and as a benchmark, by setting a reference point for excellence. In both roles, AI wasn’t replacing effort but amplifying motivation.

My Research - Recognizing Students’ Emotions in Vietnamese Social Media Platforms

That talk crystallized something for me: the real key lies not in the technology itself, but in why students use it. Are they motivated by curiosity, by fear, by convenience, by ambition? That question shaped my next step: my current research on the relationship between students’ motivation to use AI and their learning autonomy. By studying how intrinsic and extrinsic motivations interact with AI-assisted learning behaviors, I hope to uncover whether AI truly empowers students to take control of their learning, or whether it risks eroding their independence. Ultimately, this research aims to provide evidence-based recommendations for educators, policymakers, and educational technology developers to design autonomy-supportive AI integration strategies in Vietnamese secondary education.

In the end, AI is not simply a shortcut or a threat. I believe it is a catalyst. It forces students to reach deeper, and it challenges teachers and schools to raise their standards. Used well, AI doesn’t replace effort; it redefines learning, pushing education toward greater curiosity, autonomy, and resilience.

Projects & Achievements

Horizon Academic Essay Prize – Honorable Mentions
Topic: AI’s role in enhancing our autonomy in the ability to think for ourselves

Publication: Recognizing Students’ Emotions in Vietnamese Social Media Platforms, presented at The 9th International Conference on Innovation in Artificial Intelligence (ICIAI 2025)
The objective of this research is to detect students’ emotions on social media in order to provide insights that enhance teaching methods, improve learning environments, and support timely interventions for student well-being and academic success.

The Relationship Between Students’ Motivation to Use AI in Learning and Their Learning Autonomy: A Study Among High School Students in Hanoi
By investigating this relationship, the present study aims to generate actionable evidence to guide policymakers, school leaders, and teachers in fostering an educational environment where AI serves as support for independent learning rather than a limitation.