INU aims to stand at center of Northeast Asian education

Incheon National University celebrates its 40th anniversary this year, setting a new goal to become a global school. / Courtesy of Incheon National University

By Kim Jae-heun

Incheon National University (INU) celebrates its 40th anniversary this year and promises to work to become the center of education in Northeast Asia by continuously developing through changes and challenges.

With a passion to top the list of world's 100 universities in the near future, the school has set a new educational goal to foster globally minded students with creativity and self-learning ability who can turn challenges into achievement and theory into reality.

To achieve its goal, INU has come up with various reform plans and innovative systems.

In early July, the university hosted the second Hanseatic League of Universities Conference at Gyeongwonjae Ambassador Hotel in Songdo, Incheon, in which presidents, vice presidents and professors from about 70 major universities from countries including the U.S., Germany, Spain, Russia, Saudi Arabia, China and Japan participated.

The participants introduced a new university evaluation system named "WURI," which is based on innovation and reform.

Unlike the existing school ranking systems that mainly give credit to research performance, campus size and other numerical values, WURI focuses on factors that enable schools' and local communities' sustainable co-development, such as a school's contributions to the local community, student-founded startups and college education on ethics.

Incheon National University President Cho Dong-sung / Courtesy of Incheon National University

"Traditional university evaluation systems like 'THE' and 'QS' puts importance on research performance, reputation and profits coming from sales of techniques, and these systems are advantageous to research-centered universities," INU President Cho Dong-sung said.

"Under these systems, universities that contribute largely to the country, local community and the innovative education are not properly and fairly recognized. A new ranking system that puts emphasis on innovation in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution needs to be adopted urgently," Cho added.

The school also launched the INU Global Language Institute last year to provide quality Korean language education abroad and to attract foreign students to learn Korean at its campus.

The number of students at the language institute increased to 1,800 in just one year, and the school has established Korean language centers in China, Vietnam, Indonesia, Mongolia and Uzbekistan. The overseas centers help students preparing to study in Korea learn the language in advance.

Furthermore, the university also entered the entrepreneur fostering business in 2000 by supporting its students. It is currently operating five start-up assistance centers on the campus where students can learn to start their own business and consult experts in relevant fields.

Its efforts were recognized by the government, and since 2011, it was the first and has been the only university in Incheon to be selected by the government as one of the leading schools helping students launch their businesses.

Meanwhile, the university has pledged to emphasize its national spirit by finding undiscovered independence fighters who worked for Korea's independence from Japanese colonial rule in the early 20th century.

Earlier this year INU discovered 215 independence fighters and submitted their reward applications to the Ministry of Patriots and Veterans Affairs' branch in Incheon. The discovery work took place in celebration of the 100th anniversary of the March 1 Independence Movement.

This is the first time that a university has found such a large number of men of merits and applied for their reward since the country's liberation in 1945, according to the school officials.

The 215 people were those who fought in a resistance force named Righteous Army who were active until 1912. Some of them were well-known heroes whose names can be found in textbooks, but have not been rewarded yet.

INU President Cho, the head of the school's board of directors Choi Yong-gyu and the head of the school's Academy of Chinese Studies Lee Kab-young participated in the school ceremony on May 29 to mark the discovery of the patriots.

On Aug. 13, the school applied for rewards for additional 550 independence fighters in line with the 74th anniversary of Liberation Day.

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