The Office of International Affairs (OIA) recruited additional student applicants for the 2014 fall semester exchange student program. This is the first time for the OIA to hold additional recruitment for the program.
The recruitment was progressed from Feb. 18 to 23, with 184 spaces still available after the regular recruitment period: 138 for English-speaking institutions, 26 for Japanese-speaking institutions and 20 for Chinese-speaking institutions.
According to the OIA, the additional recruitment was held because there were approximately 200 unexpected vacant seats due to many students’ cancellation on the exchange student program.
“Since 1977, Ewha has expanded the exchange student program by building trust with partner universities for 37 years,” the OIA said. “For the 2014 fall semester program, we aimed to select a matched number of exchange students in accordance with the number of requested students from foreign universities, which is important in building and continuing this program based on trust. Not filling the seat of opportunity for exchange students is a disappointing result not only to Ewha students but also to Ewha and the arranged universities that worked hard to provide such opportunities. It would also leave a serious blow on maintaining future partnerships.”
A total of 39 students applied for the program during this period, and 32 students were assigned to be sent as exchange students.
“Although the number of applicants was less than that of the vacant space, we think it is fortunate that we could provide more opportunities for Ewha students, and that we could lessen the number of dejected partner universities to the maximum through this effort,” the OIA said.
However, some students wished that they had been better informed about the additional recruitment.
“I think the purpose of the additional recruitment is great,” Kim Bomi (Political Science & International Relations, 2) said. “However, if the OIA had truly hoped to give more chances to students and fill the vacant seats, it should have publicized the event more actively as it was not a regular recruitment.”
The OIA’s foremost objective in selecting exchange students is to fill all of the available spaces during the regular recruitment period. Therefore, the OIA feels that future additional recruitment would not be necessary if the Ewha students nominated as exchange students were to live up to their commitment with a sense of responsibility without giving up.
“The OIA has recently developed various ways to expand the internationalization opportunities for Ewha students such as signing MOUs (Memorandum of Understanding) with renowned foreign universities, increasing exchange student scholarship support and developing short-term programs,” the OIA said. “We will continue to strive to increase the range of option for student mobility programs. However, along with the OIA’s such efforts, Ewha students’ active and responsible participation must be accompanied.”
Jang Ji-won
jiwon9402@ewhain.net