[News Terms] Crisis in Local Areas, Emerging Survival Solution: 'Glocal University'

The ‘Glocal University’ is a policy project implemented by the Yoon Suk-yeol administration to intensively support regional universities. It is a compound word of ‘GLOBAL,’ meaning globalization, and ‘LOCAL,’ meaning localization. As the crisis of regional universities deepens due to population decline and changes in industrial structure, the project aims to achieve mutual growth of regions and universities by concentrating financial support on some universities with competitiveness. The Ministry of Education established the ‘Glocal University 30 Project’ last March under the recognition that the next 10 to 15 years will be the last golden time for university innovation amid rapid decline in the school-age population and changes in industrial structure.

The project started with 10 universities this year, aiming to designate around 30 by 2026. To participate in the selection of Glocal Universities, the location must be a non-metropolitan area under the ‘Capital Region Readjustment Planning Act’ and be a general financial support university or a national university. Also, only universities, education universities, industrial universities, and junior colleges under the ‘Higher Education Act’ are eligible. Institutions under special laws such as science and technology institutes (KAIST, UNIST, GIST, DGIST) or cyber universities are excluded. Furthermore, from the 2025 Glocal University designation, universities that are not accredited by the Higher Education Institution Evaluation and Accreditation or designated as management crisis universities by the diagnosis of the Private School Promotion Foundation cannot participate.

On the 13th, the universities designated as Glocal University project operators for the first project year (2023) were ▲Kangwon National University and Gangneung-Wonju National University ▲Gyeongsang National University ▲Pusan National University and Pusan National University of Education ▲Sunchon National University ▲Andong National University and Gyeongbuk Provincial College ▲Ulsan University ▲Chonbuk National University ▲Chungbuk National University and Korea National University of Transportation ▲Pohang University of Science and Technology ▲Hallym University, totaling 10 institutions. The Ministry of Education plans to select 10 universities in 2024 and 5 universities each in 2025 and 2026.

A total of 3 trillion won will be invested in the Glocal University 30 Project. Each university can receive about 100 billion won in support over five years. Also, if selected as a Glocal University, the institution will be designated as a specialized regional university under Article 17 of the ‘Regional University Development Act.’

The Ministry of Education will annually check whether the Glocal Universities achieve their implementation plans and performance targets, conducting more intensive performance evaluations in the third and fifth years. If the evaluation results show failure to implement the plan or insufficient performance, the Glocal University Committee will deliberate and may terminate agreements and stop support. If necessary, the ministry will also consider recovering project funds.