Subscribe
E-Paper
By Chung Hyun-chae
Faculties at Chung-Ang University oppose the school's plan to adopt college-based admission instead of the current department-based one.
They claim the new recruitment system will make departments of "unpopular majors" that have relatively lower ratios of graduate employment, wither away.
According to the school, professors of the College of Humanities and the College of Social Sciences held a faculty meeting right after the university unveiled its plan on Feb. 26 to discuss joint response to the school's "arbitrary decision."
At the meeting, 420 professors of two colleges voted to determine whether they should follow the plan or not. 87 percent of voters opposed it.
Accordingly, the professors decided to release a statement to detail what problems the plan has.
"The plan was made by a minority of school officials, without sufficient consulting with other professors and students, which cannot secure procedural justification," a professor of the College of Humanities said.
Professors at the College of Natural Sciences will discuss the issue today, while those at other colleges are also considering holding meetings.
According to the restructuring plan, the university will recruit new students by colleges instead of by majors starting the 2016 academic year. Students will then choose their majors in their second semester of the second year.
For example, the College of Humanities will recruit 365 new students regardless of majors, while currently each department of the college has its own quota. Professors will also belong to the colleges, not departments.
"The purpose of the plan is to provide more opportunities for students to choose what they want to study and to improve individual competitiveness," a school official told The Korea Times. "The restructuring plan will contribute to sustainable growth of the school by laying the basis for creating new majors which combine several majors together."
But faculties and students believe the restructuring plan is actually intended to shut down unpopular majors.
"It is in line with school's move to abolish or merge low-demand majors," a professor said.
Actually Chung-Ang cut the number of colleges from 18 to 10 and integrated 77 departments into 46 in 2010.
"It wouldn't go that far. Every major will have certain amount of students through double major system," the official said, adding the school will hold meetings with students and professors on Monday and Tuesday.
But professors continue to hold a firm stance.
"We will stage a non-confidence campaign against President Lee Yong-goo and prepare to take legal action in case the school pushes ahead with the restructuring plan," Kim Nu-ry, professor of German Language and Literature Department, said.
Besides Chung-Ang, many other universities are in the process of shutting down departments with low employment rate.
For example, Ewha Womans University also announced that it would restructure its departments by merging departments whose graduates find it difficult to get jobs.
