Three out of Ten Graduates of Seoul National University Unemployed

Seoul National University (SNU) was found to have made no improvement in terms of its student-professor ratio during last ten years, marking 21.9 students per professor as of September this year, compared to 20.8 in 1991.

In addition, the average lecturing hour per SNU professor was rather prolonged in last ten years to 10.2 hours a week, thus indicating the university`s policy toward `internationally acclaimed research-centered university` was nothing but a mere word.

This figure is far higher than an average of 10 students per professor at famous universities in advanced countries, and even exceeds the 9-hour limit ordered by law as the legal hour for lecturing (lectures, experiments and practices, thesis-advice) per full-time instructor.

These figures are found in the `2001 Seoul National University Statistics` releaseed by SNU on Oct. 4.

The figure marked 15. 6 undergrads, 4.5 masters and 1.8 doctoral students over one full-time instructor, meaning one professor should instruct up to 21.9 students. The ratio differs greatly in various departments. For example, it recorded 57. 2 in the department of business administration and 56.6 in law school, at most ten times higher that those of the medical and veterinary schools, each marking 6.1 and 8.4.

The increase of burdensome workload for professors resulted from the fact that an increase in the number of professors has not risen to match an increase in the number of students. The number of full-time instructors at SNU has continued to decrease during the last three years, from 1,484 in 1999 to 1,474 as of September this year. The number of professors has risen only 11.4 during the last ten years, in comparison with 12.7 percent increase in student quota and 17.3 percent in the number of registered students. But the number of part-time instructors has increased by 70 percent to 1,266, from only 762 in 1991.

Also, full-time instructors (full-time lecturers and above) were found to give an average of 10.2 hours of lectures a week this year, an increase from 8.9 hours in 1991, and the emeriti and part-time lectures to give an average of 4.8 hours, an increase from 3.3 hours a decade ago.

Meanwhile, the research achievements of SNU professors have steadily increased as well, and thus the average numbers of books and papers published by one professor have grown to 0.61 and 10.98 respectively, each recording 0.29 and 2.61 in 1991. But research funds have reduced from 128,449,000,000 won in 1999 to 109,090,000,000 won last year.

Out of 3,868 SNU bachelors who achieved their degree in fall last year and this spring, 1,099 (28.4 percent) were found unemployed. An unemployment rate of the master’s and doctoral degree holders marked 18.2 percent.

The figures by college showed that 41.9 percent of the graduates of the school of liberal arts 41.2 percent of the school of fine art were found unemployed, and an unemployment rate of the graduates from colleges of social science, law and education was high, each recording 38.8 percent, 39.4 percent and 38.7 percent.

changkim@donga.com