North Korean Universities are ‘Top-Class’

The entrance to Kim Il-sung University.

The best South Korean Universities are ‘Top-Tier’; the best North Korean Universities are only for the ‘Top-Class’

Recently in South Korea, there have been increasing calls by employers for the ‘demolition of academic qualifications’, and so-called ‘blind interviews’ have started to become something of a trend. ‘Blind interviews’ refer to job interviews where employers conduct interviews with applicants from a blank slate, without first looking through details such as the name of the university that the applicant graduated from or their employment history. The idea is to avoid being influenced by preconceived notions about the applicant. Nevertheless, the majority of South Koreans still believe that those with degrees from top-tier universities are the most talented.

In North Korea, there is no such thing as a ‘top-tier’ university. Such universities are simply called ‘good universities’, because an adjective such as ‘top-tier’ cannot be used casually. Consequently, one of the concepts that North Korean exiles find difficult to understand when they receive asylum in South Korea is that of a  ‘top-tier university.’ The ‘good universities’ in North Korea include Kim Il-sung University, Kim Chaek University, and Pyongyang University of Foreign Languages. However, North Korea’s leading universities exist to make good party officials out of its students, and students too do not feel proud of their achievements for having entered a ‘good university’.

Of course, efforts do play a part in securing entry into a good North Korean university such as Kim Il-sung University. Nevertheless, the most important factor is the ‘family- tree’ factor. North Korean refugee Kang Ji-hoon graduated from Kim Il-sung University. He told us, “The pride that we felt about having attended a top-tier university was not so much based on having achieved something of our own accord, but rather, pride at having parents from a certain political class.” Ji-hoon added, “Since the fundamental enabler and ultimate glass-ceiling in North Korea is the ‘family-tree factor’, there is no need to stress one’s academic qualifications within North Korean society.”

To fulfill one’s career aspirations in North Korea, belonging to a ‘top-class’ is of utmost importance; attending a ‘top-tier’ university is peripheral. If one’s parents are party officials who come from a good political background and yet the individual does not hold reasonable academic qualifications, then they are looked upon as unintelligent. But the significant point is that North Koreans attend university in order to maintain their class status, rather than from an interest in moving classes by using education as an enabling tool.

North Koreans study in an educational setting where staff must take the students’ political background into account when assigning grades; their universities exist not to provide opportunities for the downtrodden, but for the explicit purpose of entrenching hereditary political privileges.