The Dankook University LINC Project Group has been selected as the nation’s most outstanding
The LINC Project Group achieved top scores nationally among universities in the 1st annual evaluation
Dankook University’s LINC Project Group has achieved the highest score of 962.11 (out of a total 1000 points) among 51 universities in the 1st annual evaluation of Leaders in Industry-Univeristy Cooperation (LINC) programs.
Dankook University has achieved high scores in creating an environment for promotion of industry-university cooperation and for its active efforts to support activities in this evaluation executed on 51 leading universities in industry-university cooperation nationwide by the Ministry of Education. Notably, DKU was ranked as ‘very outstanding’ after aquiring the highest score, as it achieved 100% of its core accomplishment index goals among 13 indices with 22 criteria standards.
As a result, it is receiving 4.7 billion won in the 2nd round of annual national support funds – an amount highly increased from last year’s 3.12 billion won. In addition, a total of 5.85 billion won of business funds will be invested in LINC projects this year, including 1 billion won of university matching funds and 150 million won from Chungcheongnam-do starting from this year.
LINC business is a university support program newly established by the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (formerly Ministry of Education) to promote industry-university cooperation. So far, the program has granted 170 billion won to 51 selected universities around the nation. This year, the grant funds have increased to 218.4 billion won and will be given to 4 year universities in support of related projects.
Cheonan Campus has been selected as an on-site type LINC Project Group in the Chungcheong region, and it has been executing various projects under the goal of setting the standard for industry-university cooperation. It has rasied the percentage of industry-university performance rate through the achievement evaluations of professors, and it has also employed 26 professors who focus solely on industry-university cooperation. It has enforced field focused education and practical classes by introducing the DASAN ICE Undergraduate System, which is an independent industry-university undergraduate system. Moreover, it has established a system for practical education in industry-university cooperation, including internships, field work, capstone design, etc. In addition, to promote field study and increased employment rate of graduates, it has established a cooperation system with 526 participating corporations and is currently supporting student education, mentoring and industry-university cooperative research, industry cooperation consulting, and technical teaching.
DKU fully supports LINC projects budgetwise by providing 1 billion won of annual funds and facility-wise by allocating space for LINC projects. As the Dankook Dental Hospital is moving to a new building, the university is building an Industry-university Cooperation Center in the former dental hospital building with renovations to be completed this July, 2013. The Industry-university Cooperation Center will house various centers including the LINC Project Group headquarters and related education centers, industry-university cooperation group offices, technology transfer center, national research center (KIST), design business center and others in expectations of creating a synergy effect. Expensive experiment and test equipement owned by the university, including those useful for research facilities for the university’s family corporations, are expected to move in.
The LINC Project Group will expand industry-university cooperation field education by increasing majors that participate in LINC projects in the future, as well as by educating industry workers and fostering convergence education between related majors. Also, it will expand operation of education programs enforcing the ability for employment while regularizing joint research with related corporations and various supporting events.
“Since we focused on improving the university’s characteristics to support the promotion of industry-university cooperation in the 1st year of the LINC program, this year’s LINC goal will be to increase performance by focusing on research, mutual use of joint equipment and employment,” said DKU President Ho-sung Chang. “We are expecting BT field specialization projects and infrastructure enhancements at Cheonan Campus to contribute to the medical biology industry, which is a powerful growing future industry in the Chungcheong region.”