By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
Sookmyung Women's University blacklisted students who participated in anti-government protests or posted comments criticizing the government or the school in its online community.
According to staff members and students of the school in Seoul, Tuesday, a student of the university found documents containing the personal information of students last November. The student handed the documents over to the student council.
The council said the school authorities filed the information and academic records of the students who had been critical of the government or the school separately from those of other students.
The list was filed by the school's student culture and welfare team, and contained the information of students who participated in the rallies against the U.S. beef import deal two years ago, and criticized the university in protests. It has also collected postings on the school's Website that are critical of the university.
In addition, the list contained students' registration numbers and information regarding their parents.
"The students' right to express their opinions has been infringed upon and personal information of the students has not been properly handled. We are demanding that the school authorities thoroughly look into the case and issue an explanation," the council said.
The council also disclosed photos of the documents.
The school admitted that it created the documents while Lee Kyung-sook was the school's president. Lee served the chief of the presidential power transition committee for the Lee Myung-bak government in 2008.
Lee left office in August 2008 and now works as president of the Korea Student Aid Foundation, a government-affiliated organization. Currently, Han Young-sil heads the university.
"We are very concerned about the incident. We will do our best to prevent this kind of case from happening again," said Kim Hyun-sook, director of the student affairs department. "We can assure you that the school stopped compiling the activists' information in November 2008, when the election for the student council was held. Our current president has nothing to do with it at all."
Kim also expressed regret that the student council made the documents public through the online community and asked it to return the data to the school.
"We can't rule out the possibility that the school might have penalized the blacklisted students in one way or another when students applied for scholarships or overseas student exchange programs," a graduate student at the women-only university told The Korea Times on condition of anonymity.
Another student said that the school violated the confidentiality expected of higher learning institutes.