Scholarship / Essays in the Application form of Irish Aid Scholarship for Vietnam [NEW]

Hi Everyone,
I'm preparing application form for the Irish Aid scholarship. I select the Master program of iBusiness-Innovation through ICT. In the form, there are two short essays that I have to fill in. Please help me check grammar and structures. Any comment about the essay ideas is welcome. Thanks.

* First essay: Please set out how you intend to contribute to the development of Vietnam and the achievement of the Irish Aid country strategy objectives in Vietnam? Why do you want to pursue nominated course? How will you use the knowledge and skills acquired through your proposed course when return to work? (no more than 500 words)

I have worked as a software engineer for nearly five years. With my experience, I understand that ICT is a powerful tool for modern business. An advanced infrastructure in ICT definitely brings more advantages to businesses or organizations that encounter with the growing competition in the global marketplace. But I usually wonder how can we bring the innovation of ICT into business effectively. How can we exploit ICT initiatives to create positive changes in organizations? I have searched many courses from a huge number of universities and found the unique program of UCD Michael Smurfit Graduate Business School. The program MSc. iBusiness - Innovation Through ICT provides everything I need, from skills for Business Enquiry to Managing Systems Development. Especially, a core module named ICT Project Management supports directly to my current work as a team leader. Undoubtedly, this module will teach me useful knowledge and skills needed for a professional project manager, improve my career perspective.

The program addresses the intersection of ICT Technology and Business, and how we can use ICT Technology to boost businesses. The program is definitely beneficial for me as a software development team leader.

In the near future, I will be better in the role of a Software development project manager, managing team more effectively, creating more useful products and services. Additionally, with knowledge and skills learned, I'm able to provide advices and give support on delivery of ICT advances to business and organizations. In a young and developing economics as Vietnam, the application of ICT in business is very really necessary and essential. I hope this will strengthen them, improve their competitiveness not only in domestic market but also in international marketplace.

* Second short essay: Please describe your two most significant achievements in both your professional and social activities to date. (no more than 300 words for both examples)

Example 1:
One of my achievements in professional activities is to lead successfully a project. The project goal is to develop a mobile application allowing users to connect to the celebrities and keep users updated news and events through social networks such as Facebook and Twitter. There are four people in this project and I'm in charge of team leader. My responsibility is draft essential features, analyze project structure and give solution for problems. At the end, my team's effort was compensated and the result satisfied us. There are over 10000 active users using the application. Additionally, after finishing the project, many other applications of my current company used the base of the previous project.

Example 2:
From the time when I was a student, I joined some of social activities organized by Student Union, such as Blood donation or collecting of warm clothes for mountainous children. Currently, I have started developing a mobile application with the help from some of my friends to support poor and unlucky people. The main feature of the application is to broadcast extremely poor cases in Vietnam and appeal the help from the community. The app exploits the power of mobile technology to collect money and the total fund will be transferred to certified charity organisations. The app is still in the development phase but I hope it can be published soon.

Writing Feedback / IELTS- Best way to improve public health is to improve sports facilities? [2]

Some people say that the best way to improve public health is by increasing the number of sports facilities. Others, say that this would have little effect on public health and that other measures are required.

Discuss both views and give your opinion.
Following is my essay, please help me check and correct it.

In most countries, public health is a important topic and take deep consideration of society. Some people argue that the best way to improve public health is to increase the number of sports facilities, however, I personally believe that it depends mainly on the consciousness of every citizen.

Advocates of the first view claim that many areas are lacking of sports facilities. In some areas, it is difficult to access these facilities because registration list is full all the time or it is so expensive that people cannot afford. For example, in Vietnam, people with modest salary hardly play tennis as service fee is very high and they have to invest sizable amount of money for accompanied equipments including racquets and balls. Therefore, increasing the facilities quantity will help reduce the service fee, encouraging people to play sports. As a result, the public health will be improved.

However, people with opposition view argue that the most important factor is the consciousness of citizens. It is clear that some people like swimming, playing football or doing gym but some others do not like playing any sports. Increasing the number of facilities therefore only takes effect on self-conscious people. To help inactive people, local governments should have training sessions or education programs to propagate about the benefits of being healthy. Furthermore, sports competitions should be organized annually to encourage playing sport or working out to keep fit. Another factor that is necessary to take into account is the quality of sports facilities. Increasing number of facilities but assuring the quality will result in lacking of player. For this reason, quality assurance process should be clear when building new sports facilities.

In conclusion, although increasing the number of sports facilities is a good measure for improving public health, I think it is better to encourage people to play sports and propagate the benefit of being healthy.

Writing Feedback / While the unpaid community service is useful for our society, we should not force students to do it [4]

Dear friends, please help me correct and assess my IELTS essay. I'm taking IELTS exam in August 03 and I'm trying to increase IELTS writing score.

Some people believe that unpaid community service should be a compulsory part of high school programmes (for example working for a charity, improving the neighbourhood or teaching sports for younger children).

To what extent do you agree or disagree?

It is true that unpaid community service is very popular in high school extracurricular activities. Although this service is useful for our society, I personally believe that we should not force students to do it.

We all know that there are many important subjects in high school including maths, science and literature, and the primary purpose of high school students is learning. These subjects will build enough necessary knowledge for the preparation of tertiary education. Extracurricular activities therefore are only appropriate when high school students have free time because these activities take a lot of time and if they are compulsory, students' study can be adversely affected. In addition, if this kind of activity is compulsory in curriculum, it will be difficult to assess students' mark. For instance, for activity like teaching younger students, the assessment of efficiency can be time-consuming and there are no standard criteria for this.

On the other hand, most of high school students will not happy if they are forced to work without payment. Unhappy students therefore cannot focus on given tasks, resulting in poor quality service. In addition, I think that some students are not ready or available for unpaid community service. For example, if students come from needy families, it is likely they have to work to earn money and activities like working for a charity is not for them. Another example is students with health problems. It seems to be impossible for them to teach younger students to play sports.

In conclusion, although unpaid community service should be encouraged for its benefits, it should not be compulsory part of high school programmes.