HUFS grabbed a second chance to receive a huge government grant.

HUFS was selected as an additional beneficiary of the government initiative for the College of Humanities Research and Education (CORE) along with two other universities, Chungnam National University and Daegu Haany University on Aug. 28.

The CORE initiative is the first government-funded program to protect and advance humanities education in college. Universities chosen for this program will receive grants worth a total of 60 billion Korean won ($54,000,000) for three years. The grant will total 180 billion won ($162,000,000) over the course of the program.

Based on education plans submitted by universities, the Ministry of Education (MOE) and the National Research Foundation of Korea initially announced the selection of 16 colleges, including Seoul National University and Ewha Womans University in March. However, they restarted their selection process in April in hopes of finding more innovative educational models.

In the first round, HUFS had failed to be selected. The university was able to seize the second chance and is now expecting to receive a huge government grant worth 3.6 billion won ($3,300,000) for three years, for a total of 10.8 billion won ($9,800,000) after defeating 32 other competitors including Yonsei University.

The plan which led HUFS to victory was to develop a third of its language-oriented courses into politics and economics-oriented regional studies classes.

“By funding and constantly consulting with the 19 selected universities, we will completely change conventional humanities education in order to turn out excellent students,” said the Ministry.

By Choi Yun