"Creating 10 Seoul National Universities": Intensive Support for 3 Flagship National Universities... To Be Developed as Regional Industry-Academia Hubs

The government will select three flagship national universities this year as a priority to implement the national agenda of "creating 10 Seoul National Universities," and will cultivate them as hubs for local industries, academia, and research institutes. Instead of supporting all nine flagship national universities at once as initially planned, the government has decided to accelerate the project by focusing on selection and concentration. The three universities will receive package support in the fields of "growth engine," which highlights each university's unique characteristics to serve as a hub for education and research in their regions, and "artificial intelligence (AI)." The additional budget allocated for this is expected to be around 100 billion won per university.

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On April 15, Minister of Education Choi Kyojin announced the "Plan for Training Local Talent Linked to Growth Engines" at the Government Complex Sejong. The plan aims to foster outstanding talent required by companies in the strategic industries (growth engines) of each region, known as "5 Major Economic Zones and 3 Special Zones," and to achieve balanced national development by enabling local companies and talent to grow together. The intention is to mitigate the concentration of talent in the metropolitan area by enabling graduates to pursue research and employment in the same region where they attended university.

First, the Ministry of Education will establish "branded colleges and specialized convergence research institutes" in the field of growth engines at the three flagship national universities this year, providing package support that integrates undergraduate, graduate, and research institutes. "Branded colleges" refer to specialized colleges aligned with the growth engine industries of the university's region (such as shipbuilding and renewable energy).

From the perspective of companies, this allows them to secure key talent who can be immediately utilized in growth engine fields, while students can find employment with related companies in their region after graduation.

Internationally, representative examples include the "Dyson Institute of Engineering and Technology," where students are recruited as Dyson employees upon admission, and the "Rolls-Royce degree apprenticeship program," which guarantees employment after completion and pays regular salaries during study. The Ministry of Education expects each branded college to nurture about 300 undergraduate and 150 graduate core talents in industry-academia integrated programs per university.

The three universities will also be developed as hubs for "regional AI education and research." The budget for this new initiative is 10 billion won per university this year. To spread AI education across the entire university rather than limiting it to specific departments, these universities will establish university-wide AI academic organizations and a presidential-level dedicated office overseeing AI convergence education and research. Additionally, the AI developer training curriculum will be redesigned, and non-majors will be able to take newly developed AI convergence courses that combine their field of study with AI.

Within the first half of the year, the Ministry of Education will announce the "2026 Package Support University Selection Plan for Three Schools" and will receive applications containing detailed implementation plans from each university. The final selection process will take place after the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy finalizes the growth engine industries, which is expected in August this year.

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In addition to the three universities, the Ministry of Education will provide a total of 544.8 billion won this year to support other flagship universities in closely collaborating with businesses and industries to foster local talent. The core of this plan is to significantly expand "employment contract-based departments," which directly train talent needed by companies, to the level of universities in the metropolitan area. Education will also be strengthened with project-based learning designed to solve real-world industrial problems, going beyond classroom theoretical education.

Furthermore, an "AI Basic Education Mandatory Completion System" will be introduced so that all students, regardless of major, can build basic AI competencies and ethical awareness. Credit transfers and internship opportunities with overseas universities will also be greatly expanded. Academic systems will be made more flexible to support entrepreneurship, enabling regional universities to evolve into innovation hubs that create new industries.

In addition, the innovative achievements of flagship national universities will be expanded to all universities in the region to promote joint growth. The existing shared university model in each province will be expanded to the "5 Major Economic Zones and 3 Special Mega-Regions," and the scope of inter-university resource sharing will be broadened to include not only joint education but also shared infrastructure, collaborative research, and entrepreneurship support. To this end, the Ministry of Education will provide a total of 120 billion won to shared universities in each of the 5 Major Economic Zones and 3 Special Zones through the previously announced "Regional Growth Talent Development System (Anchor)" project.

The Ministry of Education stated, "We will secure the foundation for excellent talent to settle in the regions by expanding mandatory local talent recruitment at public institutions outside the capital area and introducing regional medical student selection systems," adding, "We will continue to improve local employment and settlement conditions through inter-ministerial cooperation."

The Ministry of Education will pursue "performance-based" innovation in parallel, to ensure that strong support for flagship national universities leads to tangible improvements in educational quality.

Promotion and tenure review criteria for faculty, starting with branded colleges, will be strengthened to the level of major private universities in the capital area, and a rigorous performance evaluation system will be newly established as part of robust internal innovation measures.

In particular, the three package-supported universities will jointly establish and manage core key performance indicators (KPIs) tailored to their regional characteristics in collaboration with local governments and the private sector (companies).

Furthermore, by expanding financial support from the Ministry of Education and increasing each university's own income, per-student educational expenditure at flagship national universities will be raised to 70% of Seoul National University's level (about 44 million won in 2030). Currently, per-student educational expenditure at flagship national universities is about 40% of that of Seoul National University. In addition, the Ministry is planning to institutionalize the innovation of flagship national universities in the long term by enacting a provisional "National University Act."

Minister of Education Choi Kyojin stated, "Fostering local talent is an essential task to overcome the dominance of the metropolitan area," adding, "Over the next five years under the people's government, we will not only close the gap between metropolitan and non-metropolitan universities by cultivating local universities, but also lay the foundation for local talent to become the driving force of national growth."

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