Meet Thongsy Vatthanongsa
My name is Thongsy, I am Hmong and can speak Lao, Thai, and English. My native language is Hmong and Lao language is my second. I was born in, and am currently located in Xieng Khouang province, Lao PDR.
I work with Tetra Tech as Assistant Manager, Curriculum Development Coordination, on the Basic Education Quality and Access in Lao PDR (BEQUAL) which is led by the Lao Government with support from the Australian Government. I am also studying for a Master’s degree at the National University of Laos, majoring in International Development Studies.
In my spare time like playing football, spending time with my family, seeing nature, shopping and taking trips to other communities to see their livelihood.
Describe your career to date
I‘ve worked with Tetra Tech International Development since 2017. As Assistant Manager Curriculum Coordination, I work closely with the Curriculum Co-Management Team, supporting the Technical and Coordination Managers to develop and deliver curriculum activities. This includes supporting the Ministry of Education and Sport (MoES) officers and Research Institute Education and Science (RIES) staff to manage and implement national primary curriculum materials.
With the BEQUAL program, I facilitated planning and consulting between international specialists, advisors, the Ministry of Education and Research Institute Education, and the Science staff. I also support monitoring the implementation of the new curriculum and conducting the monitoring of the financial grants to provinces and district education offices.
Thongsy and colleagues in Laos
This includes working on the Spoken Lao Pilot program, which is focused on providing support for children who start school with little understanding of Lao language.
I’ve also worked with Quality of Life Association to support and help Unexplored Ordnance Survivors and people with disabilities. In 2016 I volunteered with Give children a Choice International organization where I gained experience on education development. Prior to this, I graduated from Vonchaleun College with a Bachelor of Business Administration and Management and worked as a tour guide, where I met people from different countries and had the opportunity to strengthen my English speaking.
Why did you choose to work with Tetra Tech?
Tetra Tech offers good working conditions, career progression, and work that I enjoy. In this role, I work with teams from the Ministry of Education and Sports staff, Research Institute Education and Science, DFAT, development partners and members of Ministry of Education and sport, from the central, regional and community levels.
What do you love about working with Tetra Tech?
Working to improve education and communities’ access to better education and reforming the national primary curriculum through developing active learning approach, teacher development training, assessment strategies, and approaches to monitoring and evaluating.
Through designing programs that help primary school children to be more engaged in school and designing a Spoken Lao Program to help children learn Lao as a second language. This helps my community access better education that is aligned with ASEAN countries.
