Birthplace of creative scientists

GIST will become a comprehensive university as it admits its first undergraduate students on March. In addition, this year"s budget marks 100billion won for the first time since its establishment as it increases by 40% from the previous year. We had an interview with the president of GIST, Jung-Ho SONU who takes the lead in innovation and changes of GIST markings 16th anniversary and listened to what driving forces of GIST are.

"In Korea, no one can intervene with professors giving a lecture in class. I think this is a problem. Universities aim to teaching students. Of course, researchers are important for professors in undergraduate course but they have to be evaluated by standard of education quality. We"ll divide evaluation process into how they teach and how we should evaluate them based on full communication. "

Unlike friendliness and gentleness in his first impression, his deep insight and thought lie in his every word. Benchmark for assessment will be different in undergraduate and graduate courses.

The world"s best education level above Caltech

He took in the position as the president of GIST a year ago. The president says there have been lots of things he regrets at GIST for a year and adds that he chose GIST since he wants to make GIST a university based on the basic of education.

He had confidence that GIST with relatively short history and young faculty could turn into a university that he had long dreamed of. Now, his dream comes true and becomes a reality. It was that GIST first admits its undergraduate students, which is GIST"s first goal of foundation and his long-held dream as well.

"Although we start undergraduate course with 100 students, the number will increase to 200 next year and no more. We think that figure is enough for our institution. We will provide very strong and solid education for them."

Professors don"t shop short of just giving their lectures in class. Rather we will provide personal care of education taking individual students" performance and capability into account. We will make student-faculty ratio of 3:1 and give mentor system for the best education. It will be the world"s best education level surpassing Caltech of the United States.

Tuition and dormitory fee will be free of charge except dues for school supporting association worth one million won per student. Half of the students will participate in a 12-week research project in universities that we have partnership with such as Caltech. All of the classes in science and engineering will be provided in English.

In particular, GIST put emphasis on education in humanity and social science and art as we have an aim of nurturing balanced and creative talents in science.

“Subjects in humanity and social science enable people to apprehend the thoughts of others as it deals with people themselves. It is also applied when scientists see materials not just human beings. However, students majoring in science have difficulty experiencing these subjects other than when they are either freshmen or sophomores. I believe it"s vital to put creativity to our students through this education of humanity and social science in order to produce advanced human resources in science technology.

Students in freshmen and sophomore year will get basic science education like Caltech or MIT and at the same time we will highlight education in art, social science and humanity. That"s why we"re planning to give a course where students master one of the art fields such as horse riding, golf, violin and piano until they graduate.

This differentiated education will pave the way for our students to grow into creative scientists who will become leaders in science field.
 

Underlying factor of No.1 University in Asia

GIST where about 900 students are studying in M.S and Ph. D ranks 14th in the world and first in Asia in Citation per faculty of The Times -QS World University Ranking 2009. In addition, GIST comes first in 2008 patent application and registration per university faculty according to 2008 survey on university research activity published by National Research Foundation of Korea and ministry of educational science and technology. It maintains its No.1 status for the past 12 years in papers published in SCI journals.

GIST faculty members have no other time than focusing on their research. GIST has reflected their research performance in merit rating since its foundation and those who don"t publish a certain number of SCI-level papers are eliminated from promotion judgment. This is also the case with a tenure system.

The probability of passing promotion examination is very low with only 50~70%. When professors apply for promotion judgment, prominent foreign professors in the same field provide review and under Peer Review system and the impact of journals is reflected in assessment under Impact Factor system. It is no exaggeration to say that this strict rule is an underlying factor of GIST becoming No.1 University in Asia. However, the president comments that willingness and collaboration among professors were of a big help rather than regulation.

"Professors themselves set their goal to advance GIST into a global university. They establish stringent standards and system in recruiting professors in order to achieve that goal. That"s why benchmark for promotion and employment in each department is more rigorous than the overall standard of the institution. I think this liberal and competitive environment provides a good result."

He mentions that GIST aims to be among the top 30 of World University Rankings by 2020. The biggest goal is to advance into the world"s best science and engineering university and produce top 1% human resources with its first undergraduate course in 2010 and specific education for talents.
 
The president proposes that the government steps into science education for brighter future in Korean science area. Not only national Universities but also private institutions need financial support from the government.

“Technology is fast-changing these days. We have to upgrade lots of research equipment and facilities to keep up with the development pace, which we are not doing right now. I hope standards by which Universities are evaluated should be changed. How many papers are published doesn"t matter. We have to look into how faithful quality education is provided. The basic function of Universities is not in research but in developing human resources. It"s a very pity that this issue has been on the back burner."

Research quality matters too. Even though an absolute amount of national R&D is small, 5% of gross domestic product is huge. As R&D cost is increasing in proportion to economic growth, we need to take efficiency into consideration.

The president comments that now quality should be first than quantity and people in science technology should ask themselves of efficiency.

Jung-Ho SONU, president of GIST, earned Ph. D in civil engineering and hydrology at Colorado State University in 1973. He was a professor of Seoul National University and the president of Seoul National University College of Engineering from 1974 to 1995 and assumed the vice president of SNU in 1995, president of SUN from 1996 to 1998 and president of Myongji University from 2000 to 2004. He took the position of GIST president in 2008.