Why study at KU GSIS?
Established in 1991, Korea University’s Graduate School of International Studies (KU GSIS) is a leading academic institution in educating and nurturing young experts specialized in international affairs. Since its beginning, KU GSIS has been preparing students to serve as productive members of their organizations and to play leadership roles in the international community. KU GSIS has further strengthened its training of young scholars in recent years.
KU GSIS’s curriculum is taught by an international faculty educated at some of the world’s finest educational institutions. Many of our faculty have been active shapers of international and domestic policy through their roles as consultants to and officials in the Korean government, international institutions, and NGOs. This offers our students a wealth of concrete experiences, insights, and access into the inner workings of such organizations. Faculty members also engage in innovative research projects that offer students to get in touch with state-of-the-art research and the option to prepare for scholarly careers.
As part of Korea University, one of Korea’s oldest and highest ranking universities, GSIS has access to an immense range of resources throughout the university. The university has a global network of research and study exchanges with 744 partner universities in 78 countries, including University 21, a network of 18 leading universities in nine countries that promotes international student exchange programs. Our students can also augment KU GSIS’s curriculum by taking advantage of the university’s 81 departments in 19 colleges and 18 graduate schools and through involvement in research and policy centers like the Asiatic Research Institute, the Korean Cultural Research Center, and the UNDP Seoul Policy Center.
Our program is further enriched through its location in one of the world’s most economically and socially dynamic countries. Situated at the geographical heart of East Asia, Korea represents one of the prime examples of rapid economic development in the late 20th century and is now looking to apply its experience and knowledge to the developing world today. In the process of growth, its firms have become some of the world’s most powerful and its social organization has undergone a compressed and extensive transformation into modernity and perhaps beyond. And all this has taken place in the face of unrelenting political and military tensions on the Korean Peninsula.
As important as KU GSIS’s curriculum, programs, and faculty are the students that constitute the core of the program. Our students bring their own experiences from all corners of the world. Roughly half of our student body is Korean and half from other countries, including China, the U.S., Germany, Uzbekistan, Japan, Palestine, Ecuador, Rwanda, Finland, Bolivia, Ghana, Indonesia, Canada, and Thailand to name only a few. After combining their own abilities with GSIS’s demanding curriculum, some of our students have gone on to employment in international organizations such as UNESCO, UNFCCC, UNESCAP, UNICEF, the GCF, development institutions such as KOICA or the Korean Export-Import Bank, government research institutes such as KIEP, KIDS, KIE, KWDI, and GGGI, public utilities companies related to water and energy, NGOs such as the Beautiful Foundation and Humanasia, and various multinational companies in finance, trading, and manufacturing.
KU GSIS is a member of APSIA.
