Following a personnel announcement on the 15th of January, the vice president system goes into operation this year. As the president of Chung-Ang University, Lee Yong-goo acknowledged in his New Year’s address. This change concerning Chung-Ang University’s administration structure is one of the core preparations that is being implemented to enhance the overall conduct of the school in time for its centennial anniversary. The change will bring about a clear division of labor, therefore, a smoother and efficient running of the administration is to be expected.
The pre-existing 5 division system saw the Education, Research and the Administration faculty’s function become dispersed into different headquarters which enhanced the autonomy of each department. However, there was an increased workload for different departments and the separation of project documents had to be gathered together to be reviewed at the completion of a program. This process entailed the drawback of taking too much time for decision-making. Moreover, the Administration Office and the Office of Faculty and Academic Affairs experienced confusion as they did not have a clear division of labor.
The most noticeable change that we can expect from this reorganization of the system is that the Education, Research and the Administration departments will be formed into different divisions according to each of their function. The Anseong campus will be run by the Executive Vice President of the Anseong Campus and the Chung-Ang University Hospital will be managed under the orders of the EVP of the Healthcare System. A faster process for decision-making is expected to follow with a clarified division of labor. Specialization of each department is the basic concept of the vice president system.
The Provost affiliated departments are responsible for education and student support. The Provost affiliated department comprises the existing Planning and Coordination affiliated Office of Faculty & Academic Affairs and the College of General Education and other Education related departments. These departments that were dispersed before will come together.
Furthermore, the newly established Curriculum Accreditation Board and the existing 5 affiliation administration offices will be reorganized into each college’s administration office. The Executive Vice President for Research affiliation will comprise the CAU Graduate School, Library & Academic Research Services and the University-Industry Cooperation Foundation. The Office of the EVP for research and Office of Research Support are also being newly established in this affiliation. In addition, to reinforce the study of interfaculty collaboration, the Center for Future & Interfaculty Collaboration is being founded.
The departments related to the functioning of planning, operating and administrating that were dispersed into different affiliations will all become affiliated with the Executive Vice President for Administration. Thus the president will further concentrate on foreign cooperation and public relations.
We need to pay close attention on the new establishment of the Curriculum Accreditation Board, the Center for Future & Interfaculty Collaboration and the College of Biotechnology. The object of establishing the Curriculum Accreditation Board is for it to reexamine whether the different departments’ curriculum and its manner of lecturing are within expected standards for excellence. They will review the curriculum of lectures and the syllabuses issued by professors. The Center for Future & Interfaculty Collaboration and College of Biotechnology were established following the trend where convergence and integration of science and technology is becoming paramount in our society. An increased level of activity in the fields of convergent and integration studies is anticipated to follow. Even after the reorganization of the administration support for the College of Humanities, society and Business and Economics students will be maintained there.
Overall, this reorganization will allow Chung-Ang University to deal with any rapid environmental changes it comes across and to promote the competitiveness of its research and education, which are the essence of our university. This has been considered as the optimum system for the reestablishment for the university to secure continuous potential for growth. These changes have been highly anticipated that this change that will classify and specialize our school’s administration and rationalize its organizational structure to allow for the continuous reforms to be carried out that will better enhance Chung-Ang University in the future.