Hanoi (VNA) - Military-run telecom group Viettel has won the top honour at the Human Act Prize 2025 for its long-running Internet for Schools project, its representative said on December 17.
The award honours exceptional initiatives that embody the spirit of creation, dissemination and connection for sustainable community development.
The accolade recognises Viettel's nearly two-decade journey of expanding digital access to educational establishments, especially in rural, mountainous and island areas where technological limitations have long hindered learning and development opportunities for younger generations.
The project, costing nearly 2 trillion VND (76.9 million USD), has been jointly launched by Viettel and the Ministry of Education and Training since 2008, when only about 24% of the Vietnamese population had internet access and rural penetration was below 1%.
Viettel has expanded far beyond basic broadband deployment, building a robust digital education ecosystem that includes fibre-optic networks, IT and data centre infrastructure, cloud computing, cybersecurity solutions, video conferencing tools, and dedicated e-learning platforms such as ViettelStudy, K12Online, EduPortal, and SmartLMS.
To date, the Internet for Schools project has delivered far-reaching social impacts. Nearly 40,000 educational establishments, or 92% of schools nationwide, are now connected, benefiting 25 million students, teachers and lecturers with online access. It has driven Vietnam's internet penetration rate from 15% to 85%, propelling the country into the global top 20 for total internet users.
The group has extended similar efforts abroad, collaborating with governments and schools in Laos, Cambodia, Mozambique, Tanzania, Burundi, and Peru to connect thousands of educational facilities, with a focus on underserved rural and remote areas.
Many models have been adapted to local contexts, covering infrastructure connectivity, equipment supply, digital skill training for teachers, and online platforms tailored to national curricula./.
