The King Sejong Institute (Korean: 세종학당; RR: Sejong Hakdang) is a foundation established by the South Korean government that encourages learning of the Korean language around the world. It was founded in 2007. Its name refers to Sejong the Great, the inventor of the Korean alphabet.[1] As of February 2024, there were 248 King Sejong institutes in 85 countries.[2]
Background
Early Korean language teaching
Hangul, the Korean alphabet, is the written form of the official Korean language and has been used by Koreans since its creation in 1446 by Sejong the Great of the Joseon Dynasty. Most Korean language learning institutions outside Korea targeted second or third generation descendants of Korean immigrants, while Korean-language learners in South Korea were mostly foreign students, migrant workers, or spouses of Koreans.[3][4]
Rising numbers of Korean learners
The last twenty years has seen a rise in interest and demand for the Korean language due to cultural and commercial globalisation and the Internet/Communications Revolution. International interest in Korean culture such as dramas and music has increased tremendously, especially in Asia, leading to what has been termed the "Korean Wave". This has been accompanied by an increase in foreign students studying in Korea. Demographically there has also been an increase in marriages between Koreans and foreigners.
With the increase in international cooperation and business, the South Korean government has been striving to standardize the names of locations, people, and other proper nouns in Hangul. Also, there was a need for more up-to-date Korean dictionaries, as most were made during the 1990s.[5][6]
Establishment of "King Sejong Institute"
With such demand, the South Korean government established the concept of "King Sejong Institute" so as to provide integrated and standardised information and service for learning the Korean language as well as to coordinate and expand the institutes where people can learn or teach it.[7] The Institute will be developed as thebrand commonly used by all Korean language education institutes.[according to whom?] The South Korean government has recently[when?] launched its homepage at Sejonghakdang.org in Korean and English. Following enactment of Framework Act on National Language in 2011, the King Sejong Institute Foundation (KSIF) was founded in the following year as a central organisation responsible for running the Institutes and their programmes.[8] Song Hyang-keun served as the first president of KSIF from October 2012 to July 2018 and Kang Hyounhwa serves its second president from September 2018.[9][10]
Logo
King Sejong Institute is represented its symbol as shown. The shape <ㅎ> symbolizes hangul and the shape on the left shoulder of ㅎ means the name and the initial of each city where the institute is located. The example here is the Institute in Seoul (서울), having 'ㅅ' on the left shoulder which indicates the first hangul letter of '서울'.
Activities
Integration and expansion of Hangul Institutes
Annual Korean Singing Contest held at the Los Angeles King Sejong Institute (2011)
The South Korean government integrated the Korean Language Institutes being called with various names into one King Sejong Institute. For a short-term strategy, the government is to encourage to use the name "Sejong Hakdang" (King Sejong Institute) and the standard textbook and course, while reviewing a long-term strategy to run an integrated language institute.
144 institutes have been established by the year 2016. Nine more institutes have been newly established in countries such as Latvia, Myanmar, Bahrain.[11] In 2018, a new institute was added in the United States in Irvine, California.[12]
The King Sejong Institute headquarters office was established in 2012 to systematically support the institutes around the world. The office works to be the focal point that connects the institutes around the world.
Nuri-Sejonghakdang
Nuri-Sejonghakdang is a website providing a remote education system and integrated information service related to Korean language study for Hangul learners and teachers.[13][14] It is a Korean study website built jointly by various ministries within the South Korean government, including the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism, Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Ministry of Health and Welfare, Ministry of Justice, and National Institute of the Korean Language, National Institute for International Education, The Overseas Koreans Foundation and International Korean Language Foundation with Presidential Council on Nation Branding as the main contributor.
Nuri-Sejonghakdang followed a three-step plan from 2009 to 2011 as below.
Integration (2009)
Expansion (2010)
Spreading (2011)
System
Education integrated website
Study system
Teacher education system
Phone learning management system
Proficiency diagnosis system
Study support tool software
Teacher qualification support system
School administrative support system by institutes of Sejonghakdang
Production/sharing system of user created contents for Korean language learners
Service platform by service media (IPTV, mobile devices, etc.)
Contents
Collection and uploading Korean languages education contents
Create questions for Korean language diagnosis/qualification/test
Develop a Korean language teacher training education course
Develop education contents by level of Korean language/language area
Develop converted Korean language education contents by service media (IPTV, mobile devices, etc.)
Operating Environment
Build operating environment for Korean language education integrated system
Build telephone consulting center environment
Secure operating/consulting manpower
Secure/operate teachers for Korean language telephone learning
Secure Korean language telephone service teachers
Build operating environment by service media (IPTV, mobile devices, etc.)
Nuri-Sejonghakdang provides its services to Korean language institutes throughout the world, foreigners who wish to learn the Korean language, and teachers and future teachers of the Korean language. It is still collecting and developing its contents to expand the online study courses and building multi-language versions of the website for users all around the world. The multi-language version is completed.
Locations
As of February 2024, there were 248 institutions established in 85 countries around the world.[15]
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