Court: Financial Support Restriction on Universities with 'Foundation Corruption' Is Justified

A university that was denied government financial support due to foundation corruption issues filed an appeal lawsuit but lost in the first trial.

According to the legal community on the 18th, the Seoul Administrative Court Administrative Division 5 (Presiding Judge Kim Sun-yeol) recently ruled against the plaintiff in the first trial of the lawsuit filed by the corporation of A Junior College against the Minister of Education, requesting the cancellation of the designation as a university restricted from financial support.

The court stated, "According to the Ministry of Education's audit result notification, the degree of fraud and corruption committed by the former president is judged to correspond to a severe disciplinary action," and added, "The fact that the former president has already retired and no actual disciplinary resolution was requested does not mean that there was no fraud or corruption or that it was minor."

Earlier, A University failed to meet the minimum criteria in evaluation indicators such as freshman enrollment rate, current student enrollment rate, and corporate accountability in the university basic competency diagnosis project conducted in 2021.

Due to issues related to fraud and corruption, the 'university accountability' indicator was also not achieved. Reasons such as poor management of admissions screening and false disclosure of freshman enrollment were detected.

The Ministry of Education designated A University as 'Type 2 Government Financial Support Restriction.' When A University was blocked from participating in the 2023 academic year government financial support projects and from receiving national scholarships and student loan support for new and transfer students, it filed an administrative lawsuit.

The court dismissed A University's claim, stating that there was no problem with the Ministry of Education's evaluation and its criteria.

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