Last June, the main campus of Chung-Ang University (CAU) was flooded with student demonstrators. This was due to the school’s decision to abolish four majors (Comparative Folklore, Child Welfare, Family Welfare, and Adolescence Science) as part of its restructuring. The school made its position clear, stating that it “decided to embark on such reconstruction to actively deal with the alteration of the country’s educational environment, such as the decrease in the number of applicants for admission into the university, and to focus on nurturing more competitive departments.” The students protested in front of the university president’s office to object to the decision. They also took legal action, requesting the court to suspend the reconstruction, but the court dismissed their request.

Such reconstruction in CAU wasn’t unprecedented. At a similar time, Hannam University also decided to abolish two majors (Philosophy and German Literature) due to the low rate of employment of their graduates and the low rate of freshman enrollment. The Department of Philosophy of Daejeon University and the Department of Korean Literature of Paichai University were also abolished or merged with other departments for the same reasons. What are the opinions of the students about the universities’ reconstruction?

“The biggest problem is that the school refuses to talk with the students. Regarding the strong objection of the students, the university perhaps didn’t observe the proper procedure, in which the school should have come to an agreement with the students.” Yum Mi-jin (Sociology, 13, Chung-Ang University)

“Last April, I was informed that the school had decided to abolish my department. As the decision was made so abruptly and unexpectedly, I was confused and didn’t know what to do. The school merely informed us of the matter when they should have consulted us, the students. Moreover, the reconstruction happened without any post-countermeasure. It was definitely wrong.” Kim Hyun-li (Adolescence Science, 12, Chung-Ang University)

The universities, however, are not solely responsible for the reconstruction. The universities’ clinging to numerical values like employment rates has something to do with the government’s new policy. Due to the increase in the number of schools failing to meet the admission quota, the Ministry of Education decided to cut off the funding to underperforming universities. As a result, many departments were shut down, mostly from the College of Arts and Humanities. As the Ministry of Education provided the cause, it’s hard to fully blame the universities, but criticism would be unavoidable for they had judged the Arts and Humanities majors based only on numerical figures.