During the summer vacation, CNU Press and Broadcasting Center (CNU PBC) interviewed more than twenty CNU alumni living abroad, in places such as Central Asia, Western and Eastern America. CNU PBC planned to cover they story of successful but not well-known overseas alumni in order to give CNU students a sense of pride in their university and encourage them to realize their dreams. Chonnam Tribune will report the findings of this overseas coverage in an article, “Feature” in this and the next two issues. This issue deals with alumni residing in western areas of the USA.
After 12 hours flying to San Francisco plus another 10 driving to Logan, the Overseas Cover First Team (OCFT) finally met Kim Yang-hee (Assistant Professor, Dept. of Instructional Technology at Utah State University). She welcomed us with a smile and seemed a little excited.
She entered the department of English education in 1983 when a military regime ruled Korea. At that time, she was in a deep division between actively participating in the anti-government rallies and studying hard. She concluded, considering her future, that studying hard was more constructive and important than joining the demonstrations. In fact, she was forced to study by herself. “Sometimes I was embarrassed when even examinations, ways to get a scholarship, were not held due to the rallies,” she recalled. During her university days, she became a member of the Fine Tree Club so as to enhance her English conversation abilities.
She became an English teacher after graduation. With a desire for learning, she decided to study abroad. “I was intellectually exhausted and losing self-confidence, on seeing the rude behavior of my disciples. To refresh myself, I applied to Florida State University (FSU) and finally got admitted to a doctoral degree program.” After getting the degree, she became a professor at Utah State University.
These days, she is absorbed in character study of pedagogical agents which are anthropomorphized characters included in educational interventions to provide learners with social environments to motivate them for learning. Her major is Instructional Technology, and it focuses on how to reinforce what the students have learned by using anthropomorphized characters. Sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF) which is a leading U.S government agency, her three-year research project began in 2005. In the first year of study, she researched how students were affected by the gender and age of teachers who taught algebra to high school girls. “The result was quite interesting. The most appealing response was to come from my female peers.” Next session, she is supposed to put emphasis on the different competency, racial, emotional responses of the characters. Her research was Communications and Technology (AECT), and she won a “2005 Young Scholar Award”.
“My early period in this foreign country was not easy. Even the homeless spoke English better than me. I inevitably had to adapt myself into my new environment. CNU students, be confident. I was not rich enough to study abroad and I was in a weaker position than most normal people. But I have accomplished it.”
From Utah, OCFT headed for Los Angeles to visit the CNU Alumni Association. It was a four-day trip and the OCFT suffered from temperatures, which sometimes reached 115 degrees Fahrenheit (45 degrees Celsius) As we neared our destination, many Korean shops and bulletin boards came into sight. OCFT met Kim Jae-man, a property developer, who entered CNU in 1963. According to Shin Nam-su (Professor, Faculty of Architecture) who was one of his classmates, Kim Jae-man was always very active and optimistic.
He had his military service as a Reserve Official Training Corps (ROTC) officer. During that period, fortunately he was selected as an interpreter. “I was not perfect for that position but I enhanced my confidence in English there, so I was lucky.” Not having enough opportunities to get a job owing to the low level of development in Korea then, he decided to immigrate to the U.S.A. Once he visited the U.S.A., he thought the country was a new world and everything was so abundant that he determined to live there.
During the period when he was in the 8th U.S.A army, he was a chief in the design department. At that time, many competent CNU juniors did not avail of the chance to work there because of the lack of information. He didn’t like that situation, so he tried to inform them about how to get employed. “My juniors had enough ability, but they hadn’t enough information to work there. To help juniors to get jobs is difficult, but it is a senior’s role.”
Working at the federal government of California for 1 year, he launched into property development. “The opportunities are wide open in the U.S.A. If one has sufficient professional experience, diligence and confidence, anybody can succeed.” He is now realizing his final project, the establishment of a new town in Oak City, for which the project scale is nearly 18 million dollars. He is looking forward to retiring after finishing this project.
He emphasized one thing to CNU juniors. “Study hard at your major and try to be competitive. Life is the sum of every moment. Your sincere sweat will never betray you.”
From L.A onto San Jose took just 1 hour and there we met Ryu Ho-seong, the youngest alumni, who works for Nokia in San Diego. Nokia is a world-leading cellular phone manufacturing company. Its second-quarter global market share for this year was about twice the sum of Samsung and LG, combined. It manufactures a million sets of phones a day.
He entered the metallurgical engineering department in 1991. The social atmosphere of his school days made it hard to concentrate on studying. “I was on the spot where Park Seung-hee burned herself to death, in protest against the anti-democrat government in 1991. I was shocked and at a loss at what to do.”
After graduating from CNU, he chose to continue his studies at a higher level to increase his competency and to get a better job. Therefore, he prepared to study abroad for a year, and studied at Georgia Tech, majoring in Aerospace Engineering. “The quality of education in the graduate school was great because professor taught mathematics so practical and nearly every assignment was to be accomplished as a team unit.”
After graduation from Georgia Tech, he worked at Sun Microsystems for 3 years. While searching for a job, he used innovative ways to try and find one. In particular, he sent his resume to the Chamber of Commerce to inform it of his abilities. Receiving an interview request, he had a chance of a job. “Although I wasn’t able to get the job, I was able to create a good impression and build a social network.”
Since leaving Sun Microsystems, Ho-seong has been working for Nokia as a research engineer who is in charge of multi-languages support.
He advises juniors who want to work at a foreign company to be extroverted. Before his team manager transferred to headquarters in Finland, he told Ho-seong that he needed to share his idea with co-workers, sometimes try to make them understood, and to have frequent communication with them. Otherwise, it would be hard to become a team manager or to go even further.
“Having fluent English ability is like a driver’s license. Without it you can’t do anything but having it is not such a big advantage any more. Therefore, my beloved juniors should master another specialty as well as English to be a global player.” With this remark, the interview was over.
Having opportunities to meet successful CNU alumni, OCFT was able to realize that there isn’t just one way to succeed. There are so many students who have this thought ‘it is too late to do that’ as well as ‘It is impossible for me to do that because I am just a local university student’. But such feelings never help students to realize their dreams. ‘Better late than never’ is clearly true. Nothing is impossible if only CNU students set their goals high and ceaselessly try to achieve them. Reflecting on the lives of those alumni we met, nobody knows what future will be painted on the life canvas of any or each of us.
In addition to the above 3 alumni, OCFT covered the following:
Yang Hae-yeon (Assistant Professor of Dept. of Physics at Utah State University)
Park Byung-jin (CEO & Chairman of Carbonic Heat)
Kim Jung-hyun (President of Y.G. America, Inc.)
Moon Jong-chul (Editor of The Korea Times Los Angeles)
Kim Jong-gun (Doctor of Obstetrics & Gynecology)
Seo Young-seok (Doctor of Anesthetist)
Period: June 18 ~ July 2 (15 days and 14 nights)
Overseas Cover First Team (OCFT):
Gi Yong-ho (Chonnam Tribune)
Choi Ji-mi (CNU Braodcasting)
Roh Eun-bin (CNU Weekly)