The name "Soonchunhyang" means "the peaceful hometown complying with the will of heaven." In 1978 Dr. Succ-jo Suh, a renowned authority in neurology, established Soonchunhyang Medical College with fewer than one hundred students to educate aspiring doctors.
The University currently has six colleges and six graduate schools with over 12,000 students enrolled and approximately 380 faculty members.
SCH has powerful medicine and medical sciences departments and has continuously strived to excel in education and research. SCH's reputation for quality education has been continually proved when the Ministry of Education has granted the "National Award for Educational Renovation" for three successive years.
The University was also selected to participate in many nationally funded projects, including the "Brain Korea 21 Project" for info-tech research and education.
SCH pride itself on having creative and competitive programs and the educational philosophy "Love of Human Beings." With eighty foreign instructors and about five hundred international students of various nationalities, the University is getting more globalized in the student body and faculty. The University is affiliated with 48 universities in 10 countries and actively pursuing its study abroad programs.
Soonchunhyang has a mission to contribute to making a better society through faithful education, research, and dedicated public services based on the philosophy of Soonchunhyang, which is 'Respect for Humanity.' We want to accomplish our mission by what we are now calling "Outreach Education," which is sharing our thoughts and knowledge through public services. Soonchunhyang will move forward to accomplish a well-rounded education and develop our Respect for Humanity philosophy through volunteer works and services.
Each day, we have been striving to practice Respect for Humanity through teaching and learning, which was established by Soonchunhyang founder, Hyang Seol. When the community is needed to help out, we provided volunteer medical assistance abroad every year, and the Phoenix Corps program is key to our success. The Phoenix Corps is a program for students to help poor people internationally and domestically. The volunteering team, along with the faculty and staff, has been practicing Respect for Humanity by providing regular medical treatments to underprivileged and alienated poor people in the local community.
The highest values of Soonchunhyang are individual creativity and passion, respect and consideration for one another, following the path to righteousness, and contributing as a team. Soonchunhyang's identity is composed of the internalization of these core values. In the future, we will become a more respected university and a strong leader in Korea through these core values.
Soonchunhyang has been diligent in becoming a more prestigious, private university, establishing Unitopia 2020, part of Soonchunhyang's Comprehensive Development Plan. We have enforced our push for global education in various ways by opening Soonchunhyang University Station on the metropolitan subway. The subway allows the campus to be more accessible to the rest of Korea and beyond.
Furthermore, we are devoted to constructing a desirable educational environment by strengthening our education-infrastructure in the medical-bio field, nurturing specialists in the field of society via specialized strategies, seeking out and training sincere and talented individuals, making a development fund, and expanding scholarship funding. Soonchunhyang has been accredited as a qualified educational institution through various media outlets. Soonchunhyang was ranked 24th in the National University Evaluation results organized by a famous media company in Korea. It was also in the 1st group among the top 30 universities evaluated in the University Continuation Possibility Index in 2012. Soonchunhyang will try to become a consistently developed and improved educational institution.
Soonchunhyang will have a more mature performance in the future. Soonchunhyang continues to make a great effort to practice Respect for Humanity in the spirit of Hyang Seol. We embody a unique University full of creativity by practicing Outreach Education consistently with our community neighbors. We nurture talented people who are needed in the local community and fit in well in the global environment. We will become a university that future students want and desire to attend, and through change, become the best University.
