Ministry of Education Selects 63 Projects for Humanities and Social Sciences Academic Support Program

[Asia Economy Reporter Lim Cheol-young] The Ministry of Education and the National Research Foundation of Korea announced on the 1st that they have preliminarily selected new projects for the ‘2021 Humanities and Social Sciences Academic Support Program.’ The Ministry and the Foundation selected 63 projects across four programs: Support for Humanities and Social Sciences Research Institutes, Humanities Korea Plus Support, Social Science Research Support, and Excellent Scholar Support.

The Support Program for Humanities and Social Sciences Research Institutes has been provided since 2019 to foster university research institutes as specialized and distinctive research hubs, cultivate next-generation researchers, and establish a virtuous cycle academic and research ecosystem. The selected institutes will carry out research projects according to detailed categories, contributing to the promotion of academic research and proposing mid- to long-term alternatives on national and social issues. Especially this year, the support scale has been expanded to improve the treatment of full-time research personnel, enable additional recruitment, and implement administrative staff support systems, thereby creating a foundation for research institutes to focus on research.

The Ministry of Education also announced the preliminary selection results for the Humanities and Social Sciences Research Institutes, Humanities Korea Plus, and Social Science Research Support programs, and plans to finalize the results in September after an objection procedure.

Meanwhile, the Excellent Scholar Support Program, which is the largest in the humanities and social sciences field supporting individual researchers, is scheduled to announce its preliminary selection results in early September. Hong Min-sik, Director of University Academic Policy at the Ministry of Education, emphasized, “The need to expand stable research bases for excellent researchers in the humanities and social sciences is increasing,” and added, “The Ministry of Education will continue to support the execution of research projects and the cultivation of personnel in the humanities and social sciences through various supports such as for Humanities and Social Sciences Research Institutes.”

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.