February 2012
In high school, I would arrive home to find my sister with a laptop listening to Korean pop. Even to this day, I could never understand why she liked K-pop so much. I mean, it was in a foreign language that she could barely understand, with a couple of English words jumbled here and there. And then at Stony Brook, I was amazed that my sister was not alone - even some of my non-Asian friends listened to K-pop from bands like SNSD, SS501 and ShinEE.
But what else does Korean pop have to do with Stony Brook? Even SBU President Samuel Stanley knows K-pop. Coincidentally, two years ago Dr. Stanley had a photo of Girls Generation in his office which then future President of SUNY Korea Joshua Choonho Kim quickly identified. It turns out that one of Stanley's daughters is a huge K-pop fan. Luckily, Dr. Kim was also on good terms with the entertainment producer of Girls Generation and arranged a meeting between the members of the band and the President. He even got Girls Generation to record a video, now on YouTube, congratulating SUNY Korea on opening!
Korean influence is not just limited to its music however - South Korea is a leader in technological innovation worldwide as well. In 2009, Hyundai, the Korean automotive company, won North American Car of the Year - and it's head of R&D is Stony Brook alumnus Dr. Hyun Soon Lee. Samsung and LG, two very well-known companies, produce a wide array of phones, electronics and household appliances that are among the top brands in the US. However, to build on its record of innovation, Korea needs to churn out skilled students in information systems and technology from its universities.
In 2012, SUNY Korea will be one of these institutions producing superb students in science and technology. And on the flip side, it will give Stony Brook students a springboard not only into Korea but all of Asia. SUNY Korea will admit its first incoming class this March, offering majors in Computer Science and Technology and Management Systems at the graduate level. Undergraduate majors are scheduled to begin within two years.
President Kim summed up SUNY Korea when he said “plus 1”. As a part of the educational philosophy, he wants to merge Asian thinking with Western technology as a way of modernizing Korea's educational system. He plans to have a diverse incoming class to give students different perspectives on culture and modes of thought. So for Asians it's Asian education plus Western. For American students, it's Western education plus Asian. +1
But Dr. Kim doesn’t stop there. His ambitious vision for SUNY Korea extends to conducting business in Korea as well. He wants to combine the best elements of Korean management with Japanese and American styles to create a new, superb style of management to teach students. At the same time, he wants to instill in students good ethics and views business as a key agent of change for the 21st century.
Having previous experience as the president of KETI, the Korean Electronic Technology Institute, he knows that cutting-edge research, effective marketing and special programs, such as the collaboration with POSTECH in a combined $50 million USD, 10 year grant they won together last summer, are crucial in achieving this goal.
Stony Brook University also has another sphere of influence here. In 2010 the College of Engineering opened up CEWIT Korea, a research institute modeled after CEWIT, the Center of Excellence in Wireless and Information Technology, at Stony Brook. It is now based on the SUNY Korea campus and will open up incredible new research opportunities for students studying at SUNY Korea and for faculty from Stony Brook who come to teach there.
SUNY Korea's location, thirty miles west of Seoul, also provides it with a distinct advantage. Songdo City is a technological hub - home to theConvensia (one of Asia’s only LEED certified green convention centers), and the 68 story Northeast Asia Trade Tower (installed with computers that run on green energy), currently the tallest building in Korea. This is based on an initiative to promote future green business development. The government of South Korea under President Lee Myung-bak began with a $38 billion dollar stimulus package to promote green energy in this region, known as the Incheon Free Economic Zone (IFEZ) and in 2010 doubled the stimulus to $83 billion dollars.
But it gets even better:
- SUNY Korea has a modest price tag. Students from Asia, including Korea, will pay out-of-state tuition. There is no way around that since it's still a SUNY public university. But housing and living expenses are about one third of what they are in the US and transportation costs will be non-existent or greatly reduced. That will make it far less expensive for Asian students, especially Koreans, to get their Stony Brook degree there rather than coming here.
- For New York State students, SUNY Korea will still be in-state tuition. It will cost the same as staying here and possibly less. The reduced living expenses there will more than cover airfare. Even low income students will benefit. Since SUNY Korea is actually a part of the Stony Brook campus rather than a foreign university, students are still eligible for US federal and state aid, loans and scholarships.
- For Computer Science PhD students it's even all completely free for the next ten years thanks to the grant SUNY Korea won with POSTECH. For this inaugural semester, even select MS CS students get a tuition waiver.
- The South Korean government paid to build SUNY Korea and the facilities for students and faculty, and will continue to pay for all the facilities operating expenses for the next five years. Stony Brook University just has to provide the faculty and run it. Meanwhile, not only is Stony Brook’s name garnering more international recognition, but the university also expands its frontiers in a booming Asian economy, generating study abroad opportunities for students combined with cutting edge research from CEWIT Korea.
I had the opportunity to meet Dr. Kim while we attended CEWIT 2011. I wrote a special report on CEWIT 2011, linked below. At the end of the conference I spoke of how much I had learned and the excitement I felt. Talking with Dr. Kim, I felt that same sense of excitement about SUNY Korea coming from him. Stony Brook will be the first American university in Korea and he wants to make it one of Korea's best. With all of the resources being given to this new campus, the plans to make it cutting edge not just in research but in its philosophy of teaching, when it is fully open to undergraduates as well as graduates, it should be a vibrant place to be. (Dare I say more exciting than here on the main campus at Stony Brook?)
by Paul Huynh
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Dr. Choonho Kim, President, SUNY Korea; Dr. Sang-Dong Lee, Chief Researcher, KISTI; Dr. Yacov Shamash, VP for Economic Development and Dean, College of Engineering and Applied Sciences, SBU; CEWIT 2011, NY photo by Ja Young |
CEWIT 2011: Cloud Computing
CEWIT 2011: Wireless Medicine and Health Technologies Morning Session
CEWIT 2011: Wireless Medicine and Health Technologies Afternoon Session
CEWIT 2011: International Array of Poster Presentations
Special Series: SUNY Korea www.aaezine.org/SUNYKorea/
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