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Phase Two of BK 21 Project Proceeding Well

Phase Two of BK 21 Project Proceeding Well
-Researcher support and international academic exchange increase exponentially

Forty-four groups within Seoul National University are involved in the second phase of the BK 21 Project, which is continuing from its initial stint from 1999 to 2005. The first phase of the project was deemed successful for training creative, world-class graduate students and new researchers, promoting international collaboration by benchmarking world-class universities, and innovating the educational curriculum. The second phase will continue to build on these results, focusing on the stable establishment of the research-oriented university system, the development of highly- skilled human resources in core fields, such as developing original, core technologies, creating new growth engines, and increasing the support for graduate students, the next generation of academia.

A particular point of interest in the seven-year, 290 billion won annual budget of the BK 21 Project is the economic support it provides for researchers. Each year, it will support over twenty thousand outstanding masters/doctoral students; providing a monthly research stipend of over five hundred thousand won for masters students, and over nine hundred thousand won for doctoral students. It will also support distinguished postdoctorates and visiting professors, providing monthly stipends of over 2,000,000 won and 2,500,000 won respectively.

Securing such financial resources translates into an increased supplementation of superior research personnel. An anonymous professor from a College of Engineering group claimed that it is “a fact that the quality of graduate programs has not been able to keep up with the school’s quantitative growth", and that the financial support of the BK 21 program has been a great help in allowing gifted young researchers to focus on their work. He also pointed out that in the past industrial collaborations were often carried out unnecessarily, not only because of labor costs but also to purchase laboratory equipment, however now there is no need for unnecessary projects due to BK 21 funding. A graduate student from a research group in the College of Natural Sciences emphasized that as the number of lab personnel grew, he lost considerably less time doing experiments and projects not pertaining to his research.

As the level of support for graduate students and postdocs has become on par with that of Peking University and Tsinghua University of China, and of the University of Tokyo in Japan, talented researchers from Southeast Asia, India, and Russia are making their way to Korea. There were 636 foreign graduate students enrolled for the second semester of 2007, and it is generally acknowledged that the interaction and collaboration with these students has proven beneficial, leading to improved research. Seoul National University came in first in the first-year BK 21 Project evaluation, with fourteen 'best research groups', followed by the likes of Korea University, Hanyang University, Chungang University, and Sogang University, demonstrating SNU's capability.

Also, the BK 21 Project support for graduate students and young researchers (postdocs and also visiting professors) to attend international seminars and workshops, together with support for inviting international scholars, has been widely met with enthusiasm, especially by those in the arts and social sciences.

Eun-young Cho, a master’s student in political science who attended the 6th East-West Center International Graduate Student Conference through the support of the College of Social Sciences Department of Politcal Science BK group, emphasized that"While the financial support itself is very important, it was also a chance to plan and prepare for an international conference", and went on to point out that she was lucky to be able to attend lectures and presentations by internationally distinguished scholars, from both Korea and abroad, invited by the BK program. In the case of the Department of Political Science, graduate students have published five times more articles, have been to double the number of international workshops, and attended three times as many presentations by outside researchers since the year 2006, when the BK program began. Although the specifics vary, this trend is mostly consistent within most groups in Seoul National University.

Chances for young researchers to study abroad long term have also increased. Hye-kyoung Lee, a law student who went to the University of Oklahoma through an exchange program supported by the BK program, said," I took courses on environmental law, which was divided into Indian natural resource laws, land use laws, water laws, energy laws and oil laws. Also, I had a chance to do an internship at an Oklahoma State administrative court." She explained that it was an invaluable experience, in that she was able to learn first hand about American administrative regulations and how an administrative trial works, as well as the specialization of American lawyers. As of 2007, the current number of graduate students studying abroad supported by the BK program have increased to match the level of those sent by SNU.

The successful progress of the Brain Korea program is helping Seoul National University's transition into a research-oriented institution. The BK 21 Project is playing an important role in maintaining a stable supply of talented researchers and helping to develop their potential through international collaborations and exchange programs, even in the light of public shunning of the sciences and engineering, and the humanities crisis of the 1990s.

Dec. 1, 2007
SNU PR Office