Private colleges consider expanding scholarships as alternative to tuition cut

Private colleges are mulling expansion of scholarship programs for needy students, school officials said Friday, a move seen as an attempt to provide alternatives to the growing call for slashed tuitions.
High college tuitions have been a top social and political issue in South Korea in recent weeks, but college administrators have shown reluctance to drastically lower tuitions without extra budgetary support from the government. Students and civic activists have staged protests calling for lower tuitions, and a coalition group is expected to hold a large rally later in the day on the streets of Seoul.



Yonsei University in Seoul is considering a scholarship system based on various factors, such as family income, household financial status and the number of university students in one family, according to school officials.
Hongik University, also in Seoul, said that it has earmarked 5 billion won (US$4.6 million) for a new scholarship program that covers half of the total tuition for poor students from next semester.
Korea University also plans to set aside an additional budget to assist students from low-income families in the fall semester, officials noted.
In the National Assembly, lawmakers are attempting to bar private universities from diverting excess tuition to reserve funds in hopes that they will return leftover money to students or expand welfare measures on campus.
"There is a growing concern among ruling and opposition parties on measures to legally regulate colleges' reserve funds," said Rep. Kwon Young-ghil of the Democratic Labor Party, who presented a regulation bill on the schools' surplus budgets.
A parliamentary committee on education will review pending bills on colleges' fiscal management in this month's emergency session, officials said.