A total of 284 academics from abroad including 45 Koreans will come to teach and conduct research at Korean universities on government grants.
The Education Ministry yesterday unveiled the beneficiaries of its World-class University project, aimed at fostering internationally top-notch research-oriented schools.
Fifty-two teams from 18 universities including Seoul National, POSTECH, KAIST, Korea, Sungkyunkwan and Yonsei made the final cut for the year.
They will receive a total of 121.6 billion won ($82.8 million) in state funding later this month to open new departments/majors or to hire new professors from abroad to join existing departments.
The funding for additional departments and majors will be focused on new growth generating fields such as space exploration (Kyunghee University), integrative bioscience & biotechnology (POSTECH) and brain informatics (Korea University).
"Only three teams in humanities and social sciences won the WCU funding," Park Jong-koo, vice minister of science and technology, said in press briefing yesterday.
"We plan to discuss receiving additional bids in humanities and social sciences."
Of the 284 professors from abroad, 203 will be employed full-time, according to the ministry.
They include Carlo Rubbia of the European Organization for Nuclear Research and George Smoot of UC Berkeley, winners of the 1984 and 2006 Nobel Prize of physics, who will teach at Sungkyunkwan and Ewha Womans universities, respectively.
The WCU applications were divided into three categories - to set up a new department or major; to hire professors currently employed by overseas universities, think tanks and companies as full-time teaching staff; and to invite renowned academics such as Nobel laureates, who will be required to stay in Korea for at least two months a year.
The government plans to spend 825 billion won in five years for the WCU project.
By Kim So-hyun
(sophie@heraldm.com)
[출처 : 코리아헤럴드]
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