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Starting next year, South Korean universities will recognize a greater amount of course credits earned at foreign universities. In addition, the secondary school curriculum in several Asian nations will be given approval by the South Korean government so that students in those countries can more easily gain admission to South Korean universities. Such plans are part of a government blueprint aimed at "internationalizing" the South Korean education system, the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development said on March 2.

According to the ministry’s data, 11,326 South Korean students earned a total of 162,097 credits from foreign universities in 2005. However, as domestic universities are only allowed to count foreign-earned credits toward a maximum of half of the required credits for graduation, only 162 of those students who had studied abroad were able to earn a double major. By abolishing such regulations, the ministry hopes to encourage students to study at both foreign and domestic universities and to make it easier to earn a double major while doing so.

As part of efforts to court more foreign students, the ministry plans to approve the secondary school curriculum in the Philippines, Mongolia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and some regions of China so that students there can more easily get into South Korean universities. Those nations require 10 or 11 years of education prior to entering university, whereas the South Korean government requires 12, which has been a stumbling block for students in those countries to study in Korea.

The ministry also plans to ease another rule in order to allow South Korean universities to more easily build branch schools overseas. In addition, the ministry plans to require universities to raise the amount of English-only classes to 3.1 percent by 2010 from the 2.19 percent level in 2006. The ministry will also require each university to hire more foreign professors in order to raise the number from the average 3.67 percent of the faculty at Korean universities in 2006 to 5.0 percent by 2010.


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