SEOUL, KOREA - The Graduate School of Business at Seoul National University said it would not pursue establishing a controversial new department of "creative management."
Kim Byung-do, dean of the graduate school, said on May 17, "The idea of launching a new department does not reflect the university's official view. It was just mine. Although the need for setting up the department of creative management has been articulated many times over, I defer the final decision to the government including the Ministry of Education and Science Technology.
"If the idea of establishing the department is good enough, then the government will follow through with the plan. Up until now, there is nothing determinate about it; it was just a suggestion," he said in an interview with the Korea Economic Daily.
Indeed, the graduate school has not made any official request to the ministry regarding the new department's launching. A ministry official said this is not a matter for his ministry to decide as the ministry is concerned only with the total student number and it must be the university who determines whether to create a new department and how many students to accommodate within the department.
Earlier, the dean caused controversy after proposing to create a new department within the national university named after a slogan of "creative economy" advocated by the administration of President Park Geun-hye.
