Six years after leaving home, Vietnamese graduate sings tribute to parents at Duke University commencement

Tien, 25, addressed his class at the May 8 commencement for Duke’s Master of Quantitative Management: Business Analytics program at the Fuqua School of Business. Standing in cap and gown, he paused his prepared remarks, introduced his parents in the audience, and sang two lines from “Uoc mo cua me” (Mother’s Dream), a 2020 ballad by composer Hua Kim Tuyen that closes with the line “My child, dream the dreams for me.”

He sang the verse in Vietnamese, then translated it into English for the rest of the room.

“This is probably the only part of my speech my parents will fully understand,” Tien said, his voice breaking.

Tien, from Ho Chi Minh City, had told no one what he planned to do. His parents found out only when he walked on stage. It was their first visit to the U.S. since he left for college in 2019, and it coincided with what he described as the proudest moment of his life.

Video of the moment quickly spread across Vietnamese social media platforms and accumulated millions of views within days. Tien said the response surprised him. He had stepped back from posting publicly for about two years.

He said he had long loved the song, particularly its closing plea from a mother to her child. Whenever he asked his own mother what she wanted from life, she would tell him only that she wished for her children to be healthy and happy.

“I sometimes wonder whether, when they were young, my parents ever harbored dreams of their own,” Tien said. “They scrimp on themselves but spare nothing for their children.”

Nguyen Huynh Nhat Tien with his parents on the Duke University campus, May 8, 2026. Photo courtesy of Nguyen Huynh Nhat Tien

Duke ranks No. 7 among U.S. national universities in U.S. News & World Report’s 2025-26 edition, and its MQM: Business Analytics program is among the country’s leading business analytics master’s programs.

Tien arrived there in 2025 after a fast-tracked undergraduate degree at DePauw University, where he graduated summa cum laude in 2022 after completing a double major in computer science and communication in seven semesters. He held a 3.81 GPA, placed in the top 5% of his class, and attended on an 85% scholarship. He also spent a semester at the University of Oxford studying artificial intelligence and machine learning.

Between his bachelor’s degree and Duke, Tien worked on AI and machine-learning research and contributed to several aerospace projects. He later took on management consulting work for U.S. firms, an experience he said pushed him toward graduate study to sharpen his business judgment and apply AI and data tools in practice. During the MQM program he won the 2025 Duke Product Hackathon and represented Duke at a national round held at New York University.

After graduation, Tien said he plans to move further into artificial intelligence, product development and data roles.

The graduation speech was his second viral moment in two weeks. Footage of him singing has been recirculated across Vietnamese-language platforms in the U.S., Australia, Canada and Vietnam, and has been picked up by Vietnamese diaspora communities watching their own children navigate similar paths.