HlaMin

Category: RIT

Engineering Schools in Burma

  • Dr. Chit Swe

    Highlights

    Dr. Chit Swe, Daw Khin Khin Latt and two youngest sons
    Dr. Chit Swe & Daw Khin Khin Latt
    Dr. Chit Swe
    Dr. Chit Swe at Pu Zaw Pwe
    Dr. Chit Swe with UCC alumni in Sydney
    Dr. Chit Swe with UCC Donlaba
    • Sayagyi Dr. Chit Swe is a Pioneer of Computer Systems, Education and Applications in Burma.
    • He founded Universities’ Computer Center (UCC).
    • He retired as Rector of Rangoon Arts and Science University (RASU).
    • He continued teaching and supervising graduate students in Thailand and Australia.
    • He passed away peacefully in Sydney, Australia in November 2019.

    Sayagyi’s Family

    • Sayagadaw Daw Khin Khin Latt,
    • Five children (Dr. Daw Moe Thu, U Thu Ta, Dr. Kyaw Thu, Dr. Swe Latt, U Chit Khin)
    • Seven grandchildren and
    • Three great grand children

    Dr. Chit Swe and Daw Khin Khin Latt fondly named their younger sons as Swe Latt and Chit Khin.

    Obituary

    Soon Kwyay

    In memory of Saya, soon kwyay was offered in Sydney, Australia and Pyinmana, Myanmar

    Soon Kwyay in Sydney
    Soon Kyway in Ela
    Thanks from the family

    Condolences

    Hundreds (and may be Thousands) have expressed their sadness for the loss of Sayagyi in the newspapers and in the Facebook pages.

    The following is a sampling.

    U Ba Than (M.A., Retired Director General, Thuwanna), Saya Chit’s classmate in 1947 at the first I.Sc.(A) class offered at Mandalay University and was a fellow teacher, is saddened by the loss of “Ko Chit Swe”.

    Thin Char Mi Thar Su of the University of Yangon is indebted to Sayagyi Dr. Chit Swe for his dedication to the dissemination of Mathematics

    Myanmar Naing Gan Thin Char Ah Thinn offers condolences to the family members of Sayagyi Dr. Chit Swe (Retired Rector) and Sayagyi U Aung Sein (Retired Associate Professor)

    ex-UCC Mi Tha Su (UCC Alumni) expresses their sorrow to the Founder of Computers and Computer Education in Burma. Members from Myanmar and beyond (e.g. Singapore, USA, Australia) can never forget Sayagyi and his passion for transforming his students from good to better and great professionals, educators, researchers, and socially responsible citizens of the world.

    U Win Thein (Padamyar Winhtein) has updated Wikipedia to include Saya’s pioneering work.

    Saya U Aung Zaw (AZ) spent five decades or so under the tutelage of Saya Chit. He organized mini-PZPs for Saya Chit. I attended one gathering in 2006.

    UCSY Facebook page remembers Saya as the pioneer Saya for Computer Education in Burma / Myanmar.

    I have honored my mentor Saya Chit in my newsletter, Facebook pages and my personal websites hlamin.com and lifelonglearning140.wordpress.com

    Saya Dr. Khin Maung Win wrote about Sayagyi in moemaka

    Sayama Daw Si Si also wrote about Sayagyi.

    Thanks from the Family

    The Family could not reply individually to the condolence messages.

    Interviews

    Sayagyi’s son Dr. Swe Latt has posted videos / links of Sayagyi’s interviews in

    • Sydney, Australia
    • Yangon, Myanmar
      Broadcast as part of the RU Centennial Celebrations

  • 2019 Gatherings

    • Before the pandemic, 69ers used to have Monthly Breakfast Gatherings usually at Taw Win Hnin Si (Royal Rose Restaurant).
    • Some 69ers offered to host the Gathering to celebrate their Anniversaries, Birthdays …
    • U Aung Min (M69, Chair of 69er HCF) is a Core Organizer of the 69er activities including the Annual Dinner Gatherings and the Golden Jubilee Celebrations
    • Over 40% of the class are GBNF (Gone But Not Forgotten).

  • RITAA

    Overview

    During the Adhamma Era, many associations (especially student and alumni organizations) were not allowed.

    With the dawning of the Pwint Linn Era, RIT-YIT-YTU Alumni Association was allowed to register, but many alumni were not aware of the association and its objectives. Only a few actively participated in the formative events. There was virtually no fund to operate.

    Then, things started to click.

    The office space for the Alumni Association was provided by YTU

    Donations — large and small — were received (mostly for the YTU Library Modernization Project which is a requirement for the Accreditation)

    Membership (Life membership for K60000) grew.

    Saya’s Corner was established.

    Staff and Volunteers helped with the regular and ad hoc projects

    Young alumni came forward to help with the leadership

    U Wynn Htain Oo’s post

    His post is based on RITAA Report. I provided annotations.

    • Alumni Association is a requirement to get YTU accredited.
    • First step to establish RITAA started in March 2016 with the help of YTU Management and the Organizers of Shwe YaDu Celebration
    • Drafting and approval of Bye Law
    • Implementation Committee
    • Interaction with MEC
    • Visit by evaluators from Asian Pacific Engineering Association
    • Role in SPZP-2016 Planning and Implementation
    • Registration
    • Criteria for the accreditation of Post graduate courses
    • 2018 Graduates to be assessed by Asia Pacific Engineering Association
    • Fund raising for YTU Library Modernization
    • Travel grant for staff to undergo Library Training in Singapore
    • Trying to fulfill requirements for Accreditation
    • Financial aid for eligible needy YTU students
    • Teacher’s Corner (for recreation)
    • Finding donors to support RIT athletic associations
    • Finding donors to support Maker Space (of YTU Student Union)

    Commitment

     U Myo Aye (President, RITAA) donated K5 Lakhs for the Fund to pay salary to RITAA employees.

    U San  Kyu (Vice President), U Aung Khaing (General Secretary), U Kaung Myat Soe (Joint Secretary), and U Maung Maung Than (Joint Auditor) donated K2 Lakhs each.

    Fund 

  • U Win Maung

    Rowing medal by Lake Win Maung

    U Win Maung (T70, USA)

    • He is from the Class of 69. He contracted TB and had to take a year off.
    • His friends call him “A Yo Phaya”.

    U Win Maung (George Tun, UBA)

    • He is from the Class of 69. He left RIT before graduation to get License in the field of Aviation Maintenance from the UK.
    • His younger sister is Sayama Daw Khin Swe Aye (Winnie, ChE70).
    • His friends call him “Lake”.
    • He represented RIT in rowing, swimming and water polo. He is a Back Stroke specialist. He completed Inya Lake cross lake (2000 meters) using Back Stroke.
    • During my visits to Yangon, he provided me transportation.

    U Win Maung (SPHS63)

    • He was a Boarder.
    • He played in the School Band.

    U Win Maung (De La Salle)

    • I met him when he was in the San Francisco Bay Area.
    • He was a member of BADA.
    • His younger sister is Dr. Agatha (IM1 79er).

    Mahn Win Maung (President)

    • He was the Third President of the Union of Burma. He was detained on March 2, 1962 by the Revolutionary Council which staged a Coup d’etat.
    • He had a few misfortunes : one with a parachute jump and another during a horse ride.

    U Win Maung (Soccer)

    • He played for the Burma soccer team.

    U Win Maung (Zat Mintha)

    • He is a younger son of Shwe Mann Tin Maung.

    U Win Maung (Min Yu Way)

    • He is a distinguished writer and publisher.
    • In primary school, I received the translation of Aesop’s Fables
      (by Min Yu Way and Ngwe Tar Yi) as a prize.

  • Sayas S. Arya and S. Kyaw Aye

    by Saya U Tin Myint (M80)

    အာအိုင်တီ ကျောင်းနေဖက်တွေနဲ့ ဒီနေ့လုပ်ဖြစ်တဲ့ ကုသိုလ်လေးများ

    အသက် ၈၆ နှစ် ရှိနေပြီဖြစ်တဲ့ Mr S Arya ကို အိမ်တိုင်ရာရောက်သွားကန်တော့။

    ဆရာကြီးက home made ginger tea နဲ့ ပါပလာကြော်ရယ် နာမည်မခေါ်တတ်တဲ့ နန်တစ်မျိုးရယ်ကျွေးပါတယ်၊ အဖွဲ့သားများ အားပါးတစ်ရ အားပေးခဲ့ကြပါတယ်။

    ပြီးတော့…

    အသက် ၇၈ နှစ် ရှိနေပြီဖြစ်တဲ့ Mr. S. Kyaw Aye ကို အိမ်တိုင်ရာရောက် သွားကန်တော့။

    ဆရာတစ်ယောက် ၃၅၀,၀၀၀ စီ ကန်တော့နိုင်ပါတယ်။

    Notes

    Dr. Myint Thein (M73) wrote about Saya Arya and his memorable accent.

    Saya S. Kyaw Aye is the brother of our classmate Adbul Raof (EP69).

    Saya Arya passed away on the morning of March 13, 2021.

  • Alumni

    Latin terms

    There are four terms to describe students

    • alumnus : former male student
    • alumni : former male students
    • alumna : former female student
    • alumnae : former female students

    The students may or may not graduate from the school.

    Current usage

    The term “alumni” covers all former students.

    Most universities have

    • alumni organization
    • alumni building
    • department to support alumni activities
    NorCal RITAA

    NorCal RITAA

    It is an alumni organization based in Northern California. For several years before the pandemic, NorCal RITAA provided scholarship to eligible YTU students.

    RITAA

    It stands for RIT-YIT-YTU Alumni Association.
    It is also known as ARITAA.

    It provided support for Yangon SPZPs and the YTU Library Modernization Project.

    Life membership costs 60,000 Kyats.

  • 69er Health Care Fund (HCF)

    Aung Min
    • U Aung Min is Chair of the 69er Health Care Fund. He sends monthly reports about the Income and Expenditure.
    • He and his team maintains the 69er GBNF (Gone But Not Forgotten) list. The list has 128 members (about 40% of the Class).

    Donors

    • Daw Myint Myint (C69) — donated K300+ Lakhs
    • U Khin Maung Oo (Ivan Lee, M69)
    • U Sein Myint (K K Wong, EP69)
    • Many 69ers donate once or more at the 69er Gatherings and for special celebrations.

    Volunteers

    • U Aung Min (M)
    • U Myo Nyunt (C)
    • U Zau Lai (EE)
    • U Kyaw Zin (EE)
    • U Myint Thein (M, GBNF)
    • U Shwe (EE)
    • U Myint Sein (M, GBNF)
    • U Kyaw Nyunt (M, GBNF)
    • U Sein Win (Pet)
    • U Yee Pinn (Maung Maung Kaung, M, GBNF)
    • U “David” Myint Thein (M)
    • U Win Lwin (M)
    • U Chit Tin (EE, GBNF)
    • U Aung Gyi Shwe (EE, GBNF)
    • Daw Myint Myint (C)
    • Daw Thaung Htwe (C)
    • U Kyaw Min Thein (C)
    • U Moe Hein (ChE)
    • U “Albert” Kyaw Min (ChE)
    • U Hla Shwe (Tex, GBNF)
    • U Sai Kyaw Myint (Met)

    For Upper Burma/Myanmar

    • U Myint Aung (M, GBNF)
    • U Sein Tun (C)

    For overseas

    • Daw Yi Yi Khaing (Vilma, ChE)
    • Daw Nyunt Nyunt Wai (Millie, Tex)
    • U Tint Lwin (Daniel, M)
    • U Hla Min (EC)
    • U Khin Maung Oo (Ivan, M)
    • U Sein Myint (EP)
    • U Win Boh (Robert, EC)
    • Dr. Myo Khin (C)
    Appreciation for Daw Myint Myint’s Donations
    69er GJ of Graduation

  • Benny Tan (M70)

    He matriculated from Methodist English High School (MEHS) in 1964 and was admitted to the first ever 1st BE at the RIT (Rangoon Institute of Technology). He graduated in 1970 with Mechanical Engineering.

    IMG_0074
    Handbook
    • Benny Tan (Tan Yu Beng, M70)
      Spouse : Angelina (Benny’s Xerox Copier during his RIT days)
      Two children
      Six grand children
    • He received his MS from the University of California at Berkeley
    • He worked for the Public Utilities Commission (PUC).
    • He is a Serial entrepreneur. He started with a Gift Shop at San Francisco International airport. He expanded his business as CEO of Tan Enterprise.
    • He never forgot his roots and his alma mater. He carried two copies of the “RIT Students’ Handbook” to the USA. One copy was borrowed by an alumni eons ago and had not returned the rare book.
    • The Handbook includes a list of sayas and sayamas for the 1966 – 67 academic year.
    • He succeeded Saya U Nyo Win (M65) as President of BAPS (Burmese American Professional Society).
    • He is a Founding member of RIT Alumni International. He hosted several meetings at his house.
    • He and Ko Maurice Chee (M75) served as Co-chair of the Working Committee for SPZP-2000.
    • He designed the Banner, T-shirt, mug and calendar/clock for SPZP-2000.
    • He is a Multiple Golden Sponsor of SPZPs.
    • Along with U Thaung Sein (Steeve Kay, EC70) and U Tha Htay (M70), he sponsored several Reunion and Acariya Pu Zaw Pwe for the Combined 1st BE Intake of 64 and 65.

  • SPZP-2016

    • Seventh world wide RIT Grand Reunion and Pu Zaw Pwe
    • Full Day events at Gyogone Campus
    • Record attendance
    • True display of RIT / Swel Daw Spirit
    • Many sponsors and donors
    • Free Breakfast, Lunch and Dinner
    • Entertainment and Exhibitions

  • RUESU Magazine 1951 – 52

    Feedback from U Aye (M62) : Class of some members

    Sitting L-R :
    Ko Maung Maung (M54), Ko Maung Maung Aye (C52), Mr. V. P. Khetrapal, Ko Hla Aye (ES52), Ko Win Maung (EE52)

    Standing L-R :
    Ko Ohn Kyaing, Ko Aung Ban, Ko Thaung Sein (M55), Ko Myint Wai, Ko Oak Soe

    U Aye (M62) wrote :

    Sitting, second from left- Ko Mg Maung Aye (C52)
    Sitting second from right, Ko Hla Aye (ES 52).