▲ The launching ceremony for LINC 3.0 in SeoulTech held in June, 2022



 

On May 9, SeoulTech was selected for the 'Leaders in INdustryuniversity Cooperation 3.0 (LINC 3.0),' a project organized by the Ministry of Education. In fact, SeoulTech was selected for the first LINC (LINC) in 2012. However, although SeoulTech finished this project successfully, SeoulTech was rejected from the second LINC project (LINC+). Through this failure, SeoulTech realized there were some limits about its various programs or businesses since the university participated in the first LINC. So, SeoulTech prepared for LINC 3.0 for five years and succeeded in being selected again. Since LINC 3.0 has a longer project period and higher financial support compared to before, this is a splendid achievement. Meanwhile, through LINC 3.0, SeoulTech will receive four billion KRW per year and a total of 24 billion KRW for up to six years starting this year.

 

What is LINC?

LINC is a project that supports cooperation between universities, industries, and research institutes. The project is conducted by the Ministry of Education and the National Research Foundation to foster future talent and entrepreneurial universities through the spread of an industry-university cooperation growth model. With this project, the Ministry of Education aims to help Korea become a leading country through the establishment of an innovation ecosystem incorporating industry-university cooperation.

 

History of LINC

The LINC project has been going on for about 10 years. The first LINC carried on for four years in 2012 and targeted making or improving upon an industry-university cooperation-friendly university constitution. Next, LINC+ was conducted for five years from 2017 to 2021 and the goal was the expansion of industryuniversity cooperation fields and scope. Lastly, LINC 3.0 started this year and aimed to create a high value added and sharing ecosystem. Through this process, it can be confirmed that the goals are gradually refined and detailed.

 

In LINC 3.0, in line with the aforementioned steps, each university will continue to improve their university's talent training system and strengthen support for industrial aid and high value added creation to make mutually beneficial industry-university cooperation. LINC 3.0 is divided into three types based on different goals, and each type has a different number of selected universities and support.

The types are a technology innovation leading type, a demandtailored growth type, and a cooperation base construction type.

First, the leading technology innovation type supports the training of high-quality new technology talent and the creation of high value added based on R&D. It includes around 15 universities, with each receiving 5.5 billion KRW. Second, the demand-tailored growth type aims to train talent with field-specific job skills and high enterprise-customized support, which covers around 50 universities, each receiving 4 billion KRW. Finally, the cooperation base construction type pursued the goal of promoting the base of industry-university cooperation and expanding the training of human resources tailored to industrial demand, which has around 10 universities, getting around 2 billion KRW each. Among these, SeoulTech has been selected as the second type.

 

＊High value added means to create a high value by applying techniques to cheap materials when producing a product. More specifically, materials have low economic value originally, but by developing them through specialized processes and techniques, people create new value resulting in higher prices and greater profit.

 

Business Plan for LINC in SeoulTech

Currently, in SeoulTech, 19 departments - all the departments of the College of Engineering and the College of Energy and Biotechnology, the Department of Metal Art and Design, the Department of Design, the Department of Computer Science and Engineering, and the Department of Applied Artificial Intelligence - will participate in LINC 3.0 this year. It means that 53.8% of the students can be supported in some way by the project. In particular, the Department of Applied Artificial Intelligence, which was newly established in 2021, and the Department of Metal Art & Design will participate for the first time, so it is expected to see results across more fields than the last time.

 

The LINC project encourages industry-academic-linked and fieldcentered education, such as internship programs and Capstone Design. In a survey that was conducted from 2017 to 2019, the employment rates of the universities that were supported by LINC+ showed a growth between 2.3% to 2.9%, while those that did not participate showed a 1.1% growth rate. It proves that this kind of education helps students improve their ability to find employment or start their own businesses. With the support of LINC 3.0, SeoulTech will offer additional scholarships to the students who are involved in the Co-operative Education Program (Co-op), a regular course for job training. SeoulTech is the only university that includes Co-op in its graduation requirements (the Epic graduation requirement), so many SeoulTech students have been experiencing field-centered education already. Especially with the Korea Institute of Science and Technology (KIST), SeoulTech is implementing an annual internship program, so dozens of students can directly experience KIST's advanced R&D system every year. From this year, SeoulTech is expected to provide more diverse field experience programs with LINC 3.0. They'll also provide 700 million KRW to the departments that are implementing Capstone Design in the second semester of 2022. It is a great opportunity for SeoulTech to support the variety of ongoing curriculum experiments, such as Compounded Capstone Design and Industry-Academic Cooperation Capstone Design.

 

In addition, SeoulTech's Research and Industry-University Cooperation Foundation plans to work on three industry-academic joint R&D projects: a bottleneck technique consulting program (Pre-R&D task), a prototype production program (Post-R&D task), and an industry-academic joint research and development project (general R&D task). To differentiate from the general R&D task, they created Pre-R&D and Post R&D tasks.

The Pre-R&D is for helping researchers to start projects in other organizations, and the Post-R&D is designed for developing an existing achievement of a professor and commercializing it.

Students and faculty members can check the progress of the contest through the website of the Research and Industry-University Cooperation Foundation. Between 1 million to 50 million KRW will be allocated to those projects.

Furthermore, SeoulTech established Industry Collaboration Centers (ICC), specialized places for collaboration between universities and companies, to promote various industrial support businesses by connecting the university's strengths and industries and allowing them to utilize high-tech equipment. SeoulTech has four different ICCs: Smart Robot Convergence ICC, Smart Energy Town ICC, Next-Generation Semiconductor Materials, Components, and Equipment ICC, and Environmental Service ICC. They held an ICC launching ceremony in June 2021 and announced that the Jeju Energy Corporation and 20 other companies will work together there. At the launching ceremony, the President of SeoulTech Donghun Lee said, "Through these ICCs, we will support staff training and industry-academic technology development based on corporate demand and establish a sharing platform for the local community and industry development." SeoulTech plans to design the ICCs' specialized programs, support equipment, and promote cooperation between the four ICCs.

 

To Make a Butterfly Effect from LINC to SeoulTech

The reason why this LINC 3.0 project has an important meaning for SeoulTech is not only to give students job opportunities, but also to promote collaboration among companies, universities, and local communities. It will be an opportunity to develop technologies together with companies, interact with locals and solve regional problems together, and share curricula among universities. The goal of SeoulTech is to maintain this relationship by continuing such cooperation even after the project. Also, the fact that SeoulTech was selected for LINC twice is expected to bring more opportunities and raise the status of the university.

Geun Park, the head of LINC 3.0 and the President of the Research and Industry-University Cooperation Foundation said, "We will create a sustainable university ecosystem and establish an industryacademic cooperation model for sharing and cooperation by reorganizing the SeoulTech supporters of the LINC 3.0 organization, regulations, systems, and platforms." Besides, SeoulTech President Donghoon Lee also said, "As an industry-university cooperationfriendly university, we will promote high value added creation and contribute to national competitiveness by establishing a coexisting ecosystem between industry and university and between universities."

 

However, without the active attention of university members, including students and faculty, it will be hard to see the effectiveness of LINC 3.0. When SeoulTech participated in LINC first, the support was limited to a minority of departments. The cause was a lack of attention in LINC. To receive support from SeoulTech's LINC funding, each department had to apply to have their programs or projects participate. But few departments expressed interest because LINC wasn't promoted well to students and faculty before. Therefore, to fully take advantage of LINC 3.0 in SeoulTech and bring positive change in more diverse fields, the active interest, promotion, and participation of SeoulTech members are required. For reference, the website of SeoulTech's LINC team will launch soon, so students can check out various news and programs about LINC there. LINC 3.0 will be an opportunity to continue SeoulTech's growth. We look forward to a butterfly effect caused by LINC 3.0 in SeoulTech.



 

Reporter,

Gayeon Han hgy1228@seoultech.ac.kr

Suyoung Kong ksy6648@seoultech.ac.kr