Equipment failures lead to use of other universities’ facilities ... Jeju National University orders improvements to graduate research environment

【Financial News | Jeju = Reporter Jeong Yong-bok】 Graduate students at Jeju National University complained of the inconvenience of having to use research facilities at other universities because of malfunctioning experimental equipment and gaps in staffing. The university plans to improve its equipment repair and backup staffing systems and expand scholarships for graduate students.
Jeju National University said on the 15th that a meeting to discuss improving the research environment was held on the 13th in the main auditorium on the first floor of the Industry-Academic Cooperation Building, attended by President Yang Deok-sun and graduate students.
Expanding scholarships was the meeting’s main concern. President Yang Deok-sun asked the relevant departments to devise ways to use the university development fund, raised primarily for undergraduate students, to support graduate student scholarships as well. He particularly emphasized the need to support graduate students in the humanities and social sciences.
The view is that support systems to ease financial burdens, including tuition and living expenses, are important to helping graduate students continue their research and studies.
The government is also expanding support for graduate-level research personnel. This year, the Ministry of Science and ICT established a new scholarship for outstanding doctoral students in science and engineering and is pursuing a program to provide 7.5 million won a year to around 1,000 doctoral students nationwide. It will also select around 1,000 master’s students and provide them with 5 million won a year.
As national scholarship programs for research personnel in science and engineering expand, Jeju National University plans to develop ways to strengthen the foundation for scholarship support for graduate students, including those in the humanities and social sciences.
Issues with the operation of research equipment were also raised as an area for improvement. Graduate students in science and engineering complained that when analytical instruments at the shared laboratory facility broke down or the staff member in charge was away on childcare leave or for other reasons, they could not use the equipment and had to seek out research facilities at other universities.

The shared laboratory facility is a university facility where multiple researchers use high-cost analytical and experimental equipment together. Equipment failures or a lack of operating staff can affect research schedules and experiments.
President Yang instructed the Industry-Academic Cooperation Foundation and the shared laboratory facility to establish procedures for prompt repairs and responses when equipment breaks down, and an operating system that can immediately deploy replacement staff when the person in charge is absent.
Expanding training in research skills needed for academic writing was also discussed. The university agreed to expand special lectures on statistical analysis and academic writing requested by the Graduate Student Council, and to reflect feedback on services provided by the Office of Digital Information and the Central Library in university operations.
Protecting human rights in laboratories was also addressed as a key issue. President Yang stressed the need to strengthen university-level guidance and preventive efforts to ensure that graduate students’ human rights are not violated in the course of professors’ thesis supervision and laboratory operations.
Before the meeting, a scholarship certificate presentation ceremony was also held for 17 outstanding master’s and doctoral students in science and engineering. Scholarship certificates and medals bearing the name of the Minister of Science and ICT were presented to graduate students selected for the Korea Student Aid Foundation (KOSAF) Outstanding Scholarship Program. President Yang presented the certificates in person and encouraged the students in their research achievements and academic growth.
The meeting raised a wide range of issues directly affecting graduate students’ studies and research, including scholarships, research equipment, research skills training and human rights protection. Whether scholarship funding is secured and improvements to the equipment operating system are applied in actual research settings remains a follow-up task.
Jeju National University President Yang Deok-sun said, “I will promptly incorporate the suggestions raised at the meeting into university administration and create an environment where graduate students can devote themselves to research and their studies.”


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