Yonsei University


Yonsei University is a private research university in Seoul, South Korea. It is one of Korea's three SKY universities, a group of universities widely regarded as the most prestigious in the country.
The student body consists of 26,731 undergraduate students, 11,994 graduate students, 4,518 faculty members, 6,788 staff, and 257,931 alumni. Yonsei operates its main campus in Seoul and offers graduate, postgraduate and doctoral programs in Korean and English.
The university was established in January 1957 through the union of Yonhi College and Severance Union Medical College. This was a result of a lasting bilateral cooperation between the colleges that began in the 1920s. The institutions were the first of their kinds in Korea. Yonhi College was one of the first modern colleges, founded as Chosun Christian College in March 1915. Severance has its roots in the first modern medical center in Korea, Gwanghyewon, founded in April, 1885. As a tribute, the name "Yonsei" was derived from the first syllables of the names of its two parent institutions, "Yon; 연; 延" from Yonhi College and "Sei; 세; 世" from Severance Union Medical College.

History

Beginnings (1885–1916)

The Yonsei University Medical School dates to April 10, 1885, when the first modern hospital to practice Western medicine in Korea, Gwanghyewon, was established.
The hospital was founded by Horace Newton Allen, the American protestant missionary appointed to Korea by the Presbyterian Church in the USA. The hospital was renamed Jejungwon on April 26. As there appeared difficulties, the church appointed Canadian Oliver R. Avison to run Jejungwon on July 16, 1893. Gwanghyewon was financed at first by the Korean government, while the medical staff was provided by the church. However, by 1894 when the First Sino-Japanese War and Gabo reforms took place, the government was not able to continue its financial support, thus management of Jejungwon came fully under the church. In 1899, Avison returned to the US and attended a conference of missionaries in New York City where he elaborated on the medical project in Korea. Louis Severance, a businessman and philanthropist from Cleveland, Ohio, was present and was deeply moved. He later paid for the major portion of the construction costs of new buildings for the medical facility. Jejungwon was renamed Severance Hospital after him.
Jejungwon was primarily a hospital, but it also performed medical education as an attachment. The hospital admitted its first class of 16 medical students selected through examinations in 1886, one year after its establishment. By 1899, Jejungwon Medical School was independently recognized. Following the increase of diversity in missionary denominations in Korea, collaboration began to form. Jejungwon began to receive medical staff, school faculty, and financial support from the Union Council of Korean Missionaries in 1912. Accordingly, the medical school was renamed as Severance Union Medical College in 1913.
The rest of Yonsei University traces its origins to Chosun Christian College, which was founded on March 5, 1915, by an American Protestant missionary, Horace Grant Underwood sent by the church. Underwood became the first president, and Avison became the vice president. It was located at the YMCA. Courses began in April with 60 students and 18 faculty members.
Underwood died of illness on October 12, 1916, and Avison took over as president.

During World War II

On August 22, 1910, Japan annexed Korea with the Japan–Korea Treaty of 1910. The first Governor-General of Korea, Terauchi Masatake, introduced the Ordinance on Chosun Education in 1911, and subsequently Regulations on Professional Schools and Revised Regulations on Private Schools in March, 1915. These were intended to stifle private education in Korea; any establishment of schools, any change in school regulations, location, purpose, coursework, or textbooks must all be reported to and authorized by the governor-general, and all courses must be in Japanese.
Severance Union College struggled to meet these requirements; school regulations and coursework were altered, faculty evaluated and enlarged, its foundation and its board clarified. It received its recognition as a professional medical school on May 14, 1917. In 1922 the governor-general Makoto Saito issued Revised Ordinance on Chosun Education. It called for stricter qualifications for the faculty, and Severance reacted obediently and further recruited more members with degrees from accredited institutions in North America and Europe. Japan did not completely ignore the competence of this institution; in 1923, Severance recovered its right to give medical licenses to its graduates without state examination, a right which had been lost since 1912. Moreover, in March 1934, the Japanese Ministry of Education and Culture further recognized Severance in allowing its graduates the right to practice medicine anywhere in Japanese sovereignty.
Oh Geung Seon became the first Korean president of Severance in 1934.
Ordinances in 1915 and 1922 also affected the fate of Chosun Christian College. Intended as a college, it was not legally recognized as such, since the Ordinance of 1915 did not allow the establishment of Korean private colleges. Hence, Chosun Christian College, now renamed Yonhi College, was accepted only as a "professional school" on April 17, 1917, then a joint project from diverse missionary denominations. However, Yonhi had formed the organization and faculty becoming a university. It consisted of six departments: humanities, agriculture, commerce, theology, mathematics and physics, and applied chemistry. The ordinances, furthermore, prohibited coursework in Korean history, its geography, or in the Bible outside the department of theology. The council of missionaries reacted with A Resolution on the Revised Educational Ordinance which carefully pointed out that Japan did not apply such rigorous absurdities to its private schools in mainland Japan.
After the March First Independence Movement swept the peninsula in 1919, Japan somewhat relaxed its grip on Korea, and this is reflected in the Ordinance of 1922. It ceased the arbitrary control of governor-general over the coursework and the qualification of faculty members, and altered its stance on strict separation of religion from all education. It also recognized Yonhi as a professional school equal to its counterparts in Japan, and permitted the Christian programs and the Bible in its coursework. Nevertheless, Japanese literature became mandatory. Under Japanese intervention, Korean history was taught under the name Eastern History, and the Korean language was taught whenever possible.
The department of agriculture was closed after 1922 when its first graduates left Yonhi. Efforts were made to revive this department, without much success. However, Yonhi installed a training center for agricultural leaders on campus, with impressive results.
Yonhi was liberal in its admission of non-Christians. Its policy was to admit non-Christians relatively freely and allow the majority Christian students to gradually influence and assimilate them.
In the late 1930s, Japan again shifted its policy towards Korea to incorporate it to its scheme of expansionism. In August 1936, the new Japanese Governor-General Jirō Minami began the assimilation of Koreans, to exploit them for military purposes; The governor-general enforced Sōshi-kaimei and Shintoism on Koreans, and began to recruit Koreans for Japanese war efforts. In April 1938, the third Ordinance on Chosun Education ordered the acceptance of Shintoism, voluntary removal of Korean language in coursework, and further intensification of Japanese and Japanese history education. Yonhi Professional School did not follow suit and opened courses on the study of the Korean language in November 1938. This was not tolerated for long: In March 1940, Yonhi was forced to open courses in Japanese studies for each department and each year. In 1938, English classes began to come under pressure following a deterioration of relations between Japan and United States; coursework in English was forbidden and texts of English writers were censored. In 1938, President H.H. Underwood accepted the practice of Shintoism to avoid Yonhi's potential closure. Governors-General pushed Yonhi to refuse financial support from United States and financial difficulties mounted.
On an individual level, Yonhi faculty members and its students were apprehended or investigated during this period for their involvement in real and alleged resistance movements.
In 1939, the United States government recalled all its citizens and missionaries in Korea; Underwood and some of the faculty refused to leave Korea until forced to in 1941–1942 following the outbreak of the Pacific War. Japanese military officers were dispatched to Yonhi for military training of its students in 1940 and forced labor began in 1941. Scientific equipment, building parts, and even the Underwood statue were seized. The school yard was turned into a drill ground. Due to their value in the war, medical students of Severance were not a target of "voluntary recruitment", but Severance faced Sōshi-kaimei, military training, and constant surveillance by the Japanese authorities. Severance was coerced into changing its name to Asahi in 1942.
On August 17, 1942, the board was dismissed and Yonhi was designated as enemy property, and thus appropriated and managed directly by an appointee of the governor-general. Yonhi ceased to be a place of education and was converted into a tool for assimilation of Koreans and exploitation of manpower. By October 1943, students were practically being conscripted. In 1944, dormitories were converted into barracks and the campus was occupied by the Japanese air force. Finally, on May 10, 1944, the Governors-General closed Yonhi and replaced it with Kyungsung Industrial Management School, the primary purpose of which was to train engineers required to continue the war.
Both Severance and Yonhi were closely involved in Korean independence movements. Many faculty members were directly involved in the March First Independence Movement, as were their students. Severance continued its contribution by printing The Independence in the basement of one of its buildings, and Yonhi was as active as any other school. By the end of the movement, only 17 students were left. Yonhi students were active participants in the Chosun Student Council for Scientific Research, which was one of the leading groups in the Mansei Movement of June 10, 1926. The Yonhi Student Council and many faculty members belonging to the clandestine New Stem Association gave full support to the Gwangju Student Independence Movement. In the aftermath, students were apprehended, and the Shin Gan Society was exposed. Later on, students actively participated in V Narod and Student Enlightenment Movement during 1929–1930.
Under Japanese oppression in the 1940s, the Yonhi School kept producing Koreans who fought for independence. In 1942, the Japanese Colonial Government of Korea arrested 33 Korean students of the Korean language, including three faculty members of Yonhi and prominent Korean language scholars, Choi Hyun Bae, Lee Yun Jae, and Kim Do Yeon, as well as other graduates of the school including Jung Tae Jin and Kim Yoon Kyung. They were charged with organizing the Joseon Language Society, studying the Korean language, and attempting to publish a Korean-language dictionary. Lee Yun Jae died in jail in 1942 from torture and harsh treatment, eleven of the others were found guilty, and five including Choi Hyun Bae were imprisoned. The Japanese Colonial Court found them guilty because "behaviors such as publishing of a Korean-language dictionary is a form of nationality movement to maintain the spirit of Joseon."
Yun Dong-ju, a 1941 graduate of Yonhi School who joined the Korean independence movement, left many poems about patriotism and self-reflection. He was imprisoned by the Japanese, and died from torture and harsh treatment in 1945.
As tributes to their efforts, Yonsei University has constructed a monument called "Yonsei Hangultap", a monument for Yun Dong Ju, and bust statues of Choi Hyun Bae and Kim Yoon Kyung on its Seoul campus.

During the Korean War (1946–1952)

Severance was approved as a college by the liberated Korean government in 1947. Since most medical institutions in Korea were run by the Japanese, medical staff and faculty were in short supply after their departure. Thus, many members of Severance staff and faculty left to assist other institutions. Severance took up the role of student leadership and was outspoken against US-Soviet occupation. In 1950, during the outbreak of the Korean War, Severance functioned as a field hospital until Seoul was overrun. Severance fled hurriedly, but some faculty members and students were unable to leave in time; some were killed and others were captured then exploited by the advancing North Koreans. Severance seniors joined the military as army surgeons. Although Severance returned to Seoul for a while after its recapture, it had to flee again in December on a LST in Incheon.
When Severance arrived in Busan, its medical school joined the wartime college, a temporary body. Meanwhile, the Severance facility in Seoul received heavy damage, as it was in the center of the city near Seoul Station. Severance Hospital again returned on April 1, 1952, and its medical college on June 12, 1952.
The US military neglected the restitution of Yonhi and held other plans to use it as a military hospital or judiciary training center. With time, nevertheless, Yonhi came to be viewed as a missionary institution that was dispossessed by the governor-general.
Yonhi was able to open its doors again on January 21, 1946, and, on August 15, 1946, was recognized as a university. Baek Nak Jun became president. It was a period of transition, and Yonhi University faced obstacles including financial ones; after 1947, things settled down. At the time, Korea lacked teachers, and Yonhi was asked to provide education and training; the Temporary Training Center for Secondary School Teachers in Mathematics, Physics and Chemistry was established. In December 1948, plans for unification of Yonhi and Severance began to take form. The Graduate School was formed in July 1950.
At this point, all progress came to a halt due to the Korean War. The university suspended all courses on June 27 and recruited student soldiers. The North Korean military advanced into the Yonhi campus and established its headquarters there. This was a cause of severe damage to the campus when the US military recaptured Seoul in September. The university reopened following the recapture of Seoul, but it was once more on the run to Busan in December. In February 1951, Yonhi joined the wartime college; however, it kept an independent body and opened its own courses on October 3, 1951. On April 15, 1953, Yonhi began its work on restoration; Yonhi returned to its campus in the fall.

1953–1959

In 1957, Severance Medical College and Hospital and Yonhi University merged to form Yonsei University.

Academics

Reputation

Yonsei is one of Korea's three "SKY" universities, which are the most prestigious in the country, with the other members being Seoul National University and Korea University. Admission of these "SKY" universities is extremely competitive. Acceptance rate of Yonsei University in early admission is below 5%. In general, exhibiting 1% of academic achievement is needed to apply for Yonsei regular admission.
Inside Korea, admission to a SKY university is widely considered as a determination of one's career and social status.

World rankings

In 2019, Yonsei University ranked 5th in the QS World University Rankings for the top universities in South Korea. It ranked 21st in Asia and 85th globally. In 2016, Yonsei University was ranked 105th overall, 24th in Social Policy and Administration, 12th in Modern Languages and 51-100 in economics by QS World University Rankings. It was ranked 104th worldwide and 2nd in the nation by Center for World University Rankings in 2017 and in 2018 Academic Ranking of World Universities placed Yonsei University at the 20th position in Asia/Pacific region and 3rd in South Korea. Yonsei was ranked 96th in the world according to an SCI paper published in 2007.
Yonsei is one of four Korean universities ranked in all three ARWU World University Ranking, QS World University Rankings, and The Times World University Ranking in 2010–13, along with Seoul National University, KAIST, and POSTECH). Yonsei University was ranked 16th in Asia in 2012 and continues to rise rapidly in global rank: 112 in the world in 2012; 129 in 2011; 142 in 2010; 151 in 2009; 203 in 2008; and ranked globally 236 in 2007 by QS World University Rankings. Yonsei was ranked the 1st Korean university to be in the Economists 2011 Top 100 Full-time MBAs ; US News, 2011 World's Best Universities: Asia #18; and UK Financial Times 2011 Top 100 EMBA.
Yonsei University was ranked 36th in Reuters' "The world's most innovative university", which was announced in September 2015.

Colleges and programs

Undergraduate

Yonsei International Summer School, usually held from late June to early August, started in 1985, and it has grown over 1,300 students from over 30 countries.
Winter Abroad at Yonsei is a relatively new program, started 2013. The winter program is composed of two separate 3-week sessions which start in late December.
Yonsei University's Exchange/Visiting Student Programs offer opportunities to students who plan to study for a year or a semester in Korea.

Culture

University symbols

The "ㅇ" and "ㅅ" in the University shield derived from the first letters of each syllable in "연세". The circle "ㅇ" represents the ideal of a complete and well-rounded person, while the "ㅅ" symbolizes the upward-looking striving for scholarly excellence. In addition, the "ㅇ" stands for Heaven, the "ㅡ" represents the horizon of the Earth, and "ㅅ" signifies Man as expressed in the Chinese character. The open book stands for Truth, the torchlight signifies Freedom, and the shield protects these two core principles of the University.
The university's mascot is an eagle, and its color is "royal blue."

Christianity

Yonsei University is founded on Christian principles and purporting to "produce Christian leaders with the spirits of freedom and truth". The Christian character of the university is well illustrated by its history as a school founded by American Protestant missionaries and by its school motto from the Bible, "The truth will set you free". As of 2007, the Board of Directors of Yonsei University should include a member from four Korean Christian organizations: :ko:대한예수교장로회|The Presbyterian Church of Korea, :ko:한국기독교장로회|the Presbyterian Church in the Republic of Korea, :ko:기독교대한감리회|the Korean Methodist Church, and the Anglican Church of Korea. In Korea and Japan, Christian schools founded by Christian organizations or individuals, especially by Western missionaries, such as Yonsei University, are commonly called :ja:ミッション系大学|mission schools.
A school's founding ideology and a student's freedom of religion has been debated in South Korean society for some time. As of 2009, a student does not have to be an active Christian to be admitted to Yonsei University.
In Yonsei University entered an agreement with The United Methodist Church, in which the university will serve as the regional office for the Methodist Global Education Fund for Leadership Development.

Student life

A large number of Yonsei degree programs, including UIC, ASD, and GSIS have extensive tuition scholarships for international students that cover tuition and accommodation.
Akaraka is the official college festival for Yonsei students that is usually held on May. During the festival, many prominent singers and celebrities perform.
It is strictly forbidden by the university code of conduct to discriminate against students from non-Christian backgrounds, yet as a missionary school, Yonsei undergraduates are required to attend weekly chapel service for four semesters to qualify for graduation.

Clubs

There are more than 100 clubs at Yonsei University; the clubs listed here do not represent all clubs on campus.
Each claiming to be the best private university in South Korea, Yonsei University and Korea University have had a rivalry that is longer and more intense than rivalries between other universities in South Korea.
The rivalry is well-illustrated by famous annual sports matches between them. This event, starting in 1925, is called KoYon Jeon when Yonsei University hosts the matches and YonKo Jeon when Korea University hosts the matches. However, the above official name is actually used only for official appearances such as broadcasting and newspaper reports. 'YonKo Jeon' is commonly used in Yonsei University and 'KoYon Jeon' is generally used in Korea University. The annual one-time matches include soccer, baseball, basketball, rugby, and ice hockey.
Many students in each university come to this event to cheer for their teams, and the event has a significant meaning as many influential alumni are very interested in the result for the sake of their school spirit.
Until 2012, Yonsei recorded 18 winning seasons, 8 draws, and 16 losses. In 2012, out of the five sports, Yonsei University lost three and won two.
In 2017, Yonsei university won all five games. In 2018, Yonsei university won three games and lost one. Baseball was cancelled due to the rain.

Campus

Main Campus (Sinchon)

Yonsei University Seoul Campus is composed of Sinchon Campus and International Campus in Songdo, Incheon. From 2011, Yonsei University adopted a Residential College Program in Yonsei International Campus. Most freshmen of Yonsei University are required to live in an International Campus dormitory and complete RC programs for a year. After that, they move on to Sinchon campus in Seoul to complete their education.
Yonsei has a campus with the Underwood International College and Graduate School of International Studies programs in Seoul, and a new campus with the international Asian Studies Program in Yonsei International Campus in Songdo, South Korea.

Yonsei International Campus

Based on the May 8, 2006 agreement between the city of Incheon and Yonsei University, the Yonsei Songdo Global Academic Complex is an anchor of the R&D aspect of the Songdo area and the Korean education and research industries. Construction was in two phases with the first phase including the Global Campus, Joint University Campus, R&D Campus, and the Global Academic Village. Phase one was completed in 2010 and phase two began the next year in 2011 with further expansion.
The Joint University Campus aspect of the project is expected to be either an overseas campus of a major foreign research university or a joint campus created and managed between such a university and Yonsei University. This joint campus will be integrated and fully compatible with the Yonsei University program.
The construction of the complex began on 26, November, 2008.
The dormitory of the International Campus is composed of 12 houses. Until 2013, there were eight houses: Avison, Yun, Dong-Joo, Muak, Yoongjae, Underwood, Baek Yang, Aristotle, and Allen. In 2014, four more houses were founded: Evergreen, Wonchul, Chi Won, and Cheongsong.

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