Students graduating from SNU will be able to earn degrees from the University of Tokyo, Peking University and Hanoi University as well in the not too distant future. A joint degree program among the major universities of 4 East Asian countries (SNU, Peking University, the University of Tokyo and Hanoi University) is currently being aggressively pushed forward.
SNU announced on October 17 that the presidents of SNU (Korea), the University of Tokyo (Japan), Peking University (China) and Hanoi University (Vietnam) had agreed to participate in discussions to establish a joint degree program while attending the 12th BESETOHA conference held on October 11 under the topic,"Integration of Knowledge". According to the agreement, international affairs officers of the 4 universities will meet at SNU in March 2012 to discuss the specifics of the joint degree program. SNU expects the agreement on the program to be signed as early as next October at the BESETOHA conference to be held at Peking University. The agreement is expected to be a set of bilateral agreements between separate universities rather than a collective agreement between all 4 universities.
When the joint degree program is established, students who satisfy all the requirements for degrees from two universities under the program will be given a joint degree from both universities, with the official seals of both universities presented on it. SNU is known to have already had talks on a joint degree program with Peking University at the BESETOHA conference in 2010. Movements for an interchange among Asian universities became active after the summits of Korea, China and Japan produced an agreement to expand the interchange and cooperation programs among universities by benchmarking the student exchange program of the EU, 'ERASMUS'.
Especially, Korea, China and Japan have already agreed to start a model project called 'Campus Asia', an exchange program for undergraduate and graduate students between the 3 countries, this year. According to the policies for the Campus Asia Program announced by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology last May, the 3 countries together will select about 10 consortiums and each country is to support the exchange of 100 students annually. The Ministry of Education of each country is to examine the consortiums formed by universities of the corresponding country and the consortiums selected this year will be put into practice next year.
KIM Jun Ki, dean of SNU’s Office of International Affairs, said that under the Campus Asia Program, students will be able to study abroad for about one semester in the countries participating in the program but will be given a degree from only the university of their native country and that SNU is working on establishing a joint degree program to expand it further. He added that there still remains a lot to be discussed with Hanoi University because of the difference in the semester system and with Peking University because of the rigid social regulations of China, therefore specific arrangements will be made after practical discussions next year.
Written by YOON Byung Hun, SNU English Editor ?
Proofread by Brett Johnson, SNU English Editor, morningcalm2@gmail.com