2011 Asia Society Korea Center Scholarship Awards Ceremony
SEOUL, January 26, 2012 — Asia Society Korea Center held its 2011 Scholarship Awards Ceremony here at the Seoul Global Center. The scholarship was generously funded by the Lotte Foundation.
Providing for the children of disadvantaged multi-ethnic and refugee families is a relatively new phenomenon in Korea, and poses particular challenges for the Korean government. As it has not traditionally been a country of immigration, Korea, for the most part, has in place neither adequate relevant legislation or workable practical mechanisms for ensuring proper education for children of lower-class, multi-ethnic and refugee families. Even when these families manage to overcome systemic hurdles, they often lack financial resources to cover the high cost of education in this country.
To help offset some of these costs, and to give greater voice to children of mixed-ethnicity families, the Asia Society Korea Center, in cooperation with the Seoul Global Center, established a scholarship fund in 2009 to help further the hopes and dreams of these children. We seek to enhance people's awareness of such families, create a discourse about new partnership opportunities, to embrace non-governmental approaches, and to stimulate the imagination, potential, and future growth — not just of multicultural children, but of Korea itself.
The recipients of the 2011 scholarship are:
- Man Joong Jeon, Jong Bae Lee and Eun Young Bae from the Junggok Elementary School;
- Hyun Koo Kang from the Seochang Elementary School;
- Eun Ah Kho from the Burim Elementary School.
The following schools have also received funding towards their education program:
- Mongol School of Korea;
- Eunpyeong-gu Multicultural Family Support Center;
- Mangwon Children Care Center;
- Happylog Children Care Center.