ProfessorLy Tran

Ly Tran is a Professor in the School of Education, Deakin University. She is an internationally recognised academic in international education, with influential research spanning student mobilities, public diplomacy, geopolitics of international education, international graduate employability, education-work-migration nexus and the internationalisation of teaching and learning. Ly is also widely recognised for her expertise in internationalisation of higher education in Southeast Asia, particularly in Vietnam. She leads the Australia-Vietnam Enhanced Economic Engagement Strategy (EEES) - Internationalisation of Higher Education project, funded by the Australian Government Department of Education and co-hosted with Vietnam's Ministry of Education and Training. She is project lead for the Best Practice in International Student Engagement project, funded by the Australian Government under the International Education Innovation Fund, producing a Virtual Map and series of Good Practice Guides to support international students in Australia. Ly is the founder of Australia-Vietnam International Education Centre and leader of the International Student Graduate Employability Research Group. She also serves as a mentor in the Young Australians in International Affairs mentoring program and is a member of advisory boards for a range of professional and government agencies.

Ly has been a member of Deakin's Research for Educational Impact (REDI) Centre, Faculty of Arts and Education Faculty Board, and member of Academic Board and an affiliated faculty member of the Centre for Higher Education Internationalisation, Universita Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Milan. She is a Visiting Professor at Phu Xuan University, Vietnam, Toyo University, Japan and Hitotsubashi University, Japan. She was also an Honorary Research Fellow (2015-2018), at University of Chester, England. She is the Vice-chair of IEEE Task force on Educational Data Mining, affiliated with the Data Mining and Big Data Analytics Technical Committee of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society.

Ly has been involved in six Australian Research Council grants, including an ARC Future Fellowship, on the New Colombo Plan - Australian student mobility to the Indo-Pacific as public diplomacy, international students, education-work-migration nexus, student mobility, geopolitics of international education, internationalisation of teaching and learning and staff professional development in international education.

Ly has received more than 40 awards and accolades for her research and contribution to policy advice, practice and commentary on international education. She was named as one of Australia and ASEAN 'Top 50' voices on international education (The PIENews 2023) and one of 20 Top International Education Influencers, Edruptor 2023. Ly received the Inaugural Melbourne Asia Game Changer Award by the Asia Society Australia for her work on enriching Australia-Asia connections and strengthening Australia-Vietnam education relationships. She also received the International Education Association of Australia's (IEAA) Excellence Awards for Best Practice/Innovation in International Education (2014) and Professional Commentary in International Education (2021).

Ly has produced more than 300 publications across a wide range of outlets, including books, peer-reviewed journal articles, Good Practice Guides, think pieces, media articles, as well as government-commissioned reports and industry discussion papers. She received the Highly Commended Award in the 2019 Emerald Literati Awards and Outstanding Reviewer Award in the 2025 Emerald Literati Awards. Her co-edited book, International Student Connectedness and Identity: Transnational Perspectives, received the Honorary Award in the 2019 Best Book Award category of the Comparative International Education Society (CIES) Study Abroad & International Students SIG.

Ly has been invited to give over 100 public lectures, keynote, plenary and featured talks at a wide range of national and international conferences, industry forums, community seminars and government roundtables on international education, public diplomacy and geopolitics of international education, international student experiences, the teaching and engagement of international students, inbound and outbound student mobilities, the New Colombo Plan, graduate employability and education in Vietnam.

Ly's work has been featured in more than 100 media outlets in multiple languages in Australia and internationally, such as the ABC, SBS, the Australian, Australian Financial Review, the Age/SMH, Times Higher Education, the Saturday Paper, Xinhua, China Daily, East Asia Forum, VNExpress, Thanh Nien and VietnamNet. She has regularly written commentaries for newspapers, including the Australian, ABC, Australian Financial Review, SBS, the Canberra Times, the Conversation, University World News, PIENews, Lowy's The Interpreter & Campus Review.