Global Korea, global education

Park Chul

Dear Madam President-Elect,

On behalf of the Korean Association of Private University Presidents (KPU), I offer sincere congratulations for your success in the presidential election. The nation, I believe, made the decision based on your respect for trust and promises, in addition to your political leadership and experience. As the nation goes through this tough time of both an internal and external economic downturn, their expectations for the President to keep election promises will be stronger than ever.

As a country admired for its miraculous economic development, our nation under your leadership should make every effort and use its strengths to lead the world through these difficult times. As was the case for the miracle of the Han River, education, I trust, will play a pivotal role in such endeavors.

For education, you promised to normalize public education, focusing on school curriculum-based learning, the development of students’ creativity and talent, and school welfare for students and their parents. I share your views, and fully support your policy. I, however, would also like to draw your attention to higher education, where institutions are struggling to tackle structural issues stemming from the nation’s dwindling population, while cooperating and competing with overseas institutions to secure and develop global talent. Higher education keenly needs the government’s understanding and support for its reform efforts: liberalization, competitiveness, globalization, and social accountability. As the president of the World Bank, Jim Yong Kim, once mentioned, a nation’s competitiveness is judged by the competitiveness of its higher education.

While I appreciate parents’ financial burden in paying high university tuition, and thus understand the election pledge to reduce it, I urge the President-Elect to consider higher education institutions’ financial needs to conduct world class research and teaching, which aim to nurture global talent to support our export-oriented economy in the global market. The government’s spending for higher education currently occupies 0.6 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), regarded as one of the lowest among the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. I believe it should be increased at least to 1.1 percent of GDP. If you look at China, which is fast becoming a close rival to Korea in the world market, it now invests 4 percent of its GDP in higher education.

Educational policy for higher education needs to be further liberalized and deregulated so that institutions can have room to develop more creative and specialized programs for their students. It should be noted that applying a standardized and uniform evaluation system to all institutions runs counter to creative and specialized education.

Our efforts for globalization of our higher education should not be lessened. While globalization in the field of education may be realized in diverse ways, we should provide as many opportunities as possible for our students to experience it in concrete ways. Our universities have established a variety of programs for such purposes, assisting our students to study and work abroad through cooperation with prestigious educational institutions and government organizations, including our embassies and KOTRA offices in foreign countries. Our students learn languages and acquire knowledge and skills together with cultural awareness, which are all priceless assets in their development as true global talent. If these globalization efforts could be orchestrated more systematically at the state level, they will bring about more fruitful results, not only for education, but also for national and international development.

When U.S. President Barack Obama delivered a special lecture at Hankuk University of Foreign Studies in March 2012, he highly complimented our educational system for its contribution to national development. I firmly believe we will maintain our reputation in education through sustained efforts for reform and innovation, which can only be achieved with the government’s full support.

I wish you all the best. <The Korea Times/Park Chul>