Revelations of False Credentials Shake South Korea
Kim Hyun-jun/Yonhap, via Associated Press
In July, reports emerged that Shin Jeong-ah, an art history professor who had risen quickly in the art world, had faked her credentials. Allegations and confessions followed across South Korea.
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By SU-HYUN LEE
Published: September 1, 2007
SEOUL, South Korea, Aug. 31 — Of all the recent revelations of résumé fraud here, the one involving a prominent Buddhist monk was perhaps the most shocking to a nation that values academic credentials almost as much as it does honesty.
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Lee Sang-hak/Yonghap, via AP
The Venerable Jigwang, a monk, said he had a Seoul National University degree.
The monk, the Venerable Jigwang, had transformed a temple in an affluent district of Seoul from a struggling collection of seven souls in 1984 to more than 250,000 members today, partly on the basis of his prestigious degree from Seoul National University, the country’s top academic institution.
“People swarmed in because they heard that a monk who had gone to a distinguished university was teaching the scriptures in English,” the Venerable Jigwang said at a confessional news conference on Aug. 18. “I think that the Seoul National University title more or less helped in propagation.”
Alas, he had no such title, and in that he was not alone.
After a news agency reported in July that an import!ant art historian had faked her credentials, a nationwide wave of allegations and confessions followed that has so far swept up a movie director, a renowned architect, the head of a performing arts center, a popular comic book writer, a celebrity chef, actors and actresses, a former TV news anchor and now the Venerable Jigwang.
South Korea has been shaken as one prominent person after another has been exposed as having exaggerated, or fabricated, academic accomplishments.
The exposés have prompted prosecutors, the police, the Education Ministry and regional education authorities to announce plans to combat academic record fraud. Legislators have introduced a bill calling for a verification system.
“Before, we struggled more with fake luxury goods,” said Moon Moo-il, a public prosecutor who is leading a nationwide crackdown on document forgery and misrepresentation at the prosecutor general’s office. “Now that we have entered the knowledge-based society, we have to deal with an overflow of fake knowledge.”
In an intensely competitive country that has long put a premium on impressive degrees, suspicions that academic records had been falsified have circulated for years. But the tissue of untruths began to disintegrate in July, when reports emerged that Shin Jeong-ah, an art history professor at Dongguk University, the top Buddhist university in Korea, had misrepresented her past. Ms. Shin, who claimed to have a Ph.D. from Yale and other degrees from the University of Kansas, had risen quickly in the art world. At 35, she was appointed co-director of the Kwangju Biennale, one of the biggest and most acclaimed art events in East Asia.
Her troubles began when a member of her university’s board of directors questioned her academic record, and then brought it to the attention of the news media. It turned out that she had attended the University of Kansas but had not graduated, and that she had never attended Yale. The university fired Ms. Shin, who lost her other positions and left for the United States.
Questions arose about other prominent figures’ academic degrees. Some came forward to confess.
Among the dozen or so confirm!ed cheaters was Lee Chang-ha, an architect regularly featured on television. He was forced to give up his teaching job at Kimcheon Science College after saying he had received a degree from the department of fine arts at New Bridge University in Los Angeles. But New Bridge has no fine arts department.
The nationwide focus on academic fraud became so intense that it prompted Kim Ock-rang, the owner of a performing arts space, to avoid friends out of fear that her own lies about her academic record would be found out, she said in a television interview after her confession. Eventually, she resigned from her professorship at Dankook University in Seoul, after admitting that she had purchased her degree from a diploma mill in California.
In South Korea, degrees from top universities at home and abroad, especially in the United States, have a profound impact on everything from one’s career to marriage prospects.
South Korean children are pressured to study obsessively from an early age, often spending evenings and weekends in cram schools in preparation for entrance exams. And South Korean corporations rely heavily on diplomas to assess job applicants, though they have rarely bothered to check their authenticity.
But if more people are cheating to gain an advantage in a fierce job market, more are getting caught, particularly as people started posting anonymous tips about credentials fraud on Web sites and online bulletin boards.
Kim Hyun-jun/Yonhap, via Associated Press
In July, reports emerged that Shin Jeong-ah, an art history professor who had risen quickly in the art world, had faked her credentials. Allegations and confessions followed across South Korea.
Sign In to E-Mail or Save This Print Single Page Reprints Share
DiggFacebookNewsvinePermalink
By SU-HYUN LEE
Published: September 1, 2007
SEOUL, South Korea, Aug. 31 — Of all the recent revelations of résumé fraud here, the one involving a prominent Buddhist monk was perhaps the most shocking to a nation that values academic credentials almost as much as it does honesty.
Skip to next paragraph
Lee Sang-hak/Yonghap, via AP
The Venerable Jigwang, a monk, said he had a Seoul National University degree.
The monk, the Venerable Jigwang, had transformed a temple in an affluent district of Seoul from a struggling collection of seven souls in 1984 to more than 250,000 members today, partly on the basis of his prestigious degree from Seoul National University, the country’s top academic institution.
“People swarmed in because they heard that a monk who had gone to a distinguished university was teaching the scriptures in English,” the Venerable Jigwang said at a confessional news conference on Aug. 18. “I think that the Seoul National University title more or less helped in propagation.”
Alas, he had no such title, and in that he was not alone.
After a news agency reported in July that an import!ant art historian had faked her credentials, a nationwide wave of allegations and confessions followed that has so far swept up a movie director, a renowned architect, the head of a performing arts center, a popular comic book writer, a celebrity chef, actors and actresses, a former TV news anchor and now the Venerable Jigwang.
South Korea has been shaken as one prominent person after another has been exposed as having exaggerated, or fabricated, academic accomplishments.
The exposés have prompted prosecutors, the police, the Education Ministry and regional education authorities to announce plans to combat academic record fraud. Legislators have introduced a bill calling for a verification system.
“Before, we struggled more with fake luxury goods,” said Moon Moo-il, a public prosecutor who is leading a nationwide crackdown on document forgery and misrepresentation at the prosecutor general’s office. “Now that we have entered the knowledge-based society, we have to deal with an overflow of fake knowledge.”
In an intensely competitive country that has long put a premium on impressive degrees, suspicions that academic records had been falsified have circulated for years. But the tissue of untruths began to disintegrate in July, when reports emerged that Shin Jeong-ah, an art history professor at Dongguk University, the top Buddhist university in Korea, had misrepresented her past. Ms. Shin, who claimed to have a Ph.D. from Yale and other degrees from the University of Kansas, had risen quickly in the art world. At 35, she was appointed co-director of the Kwangju Biennale, one of the biggest and most acclaimed art events in East Asia.
Her troubles began when a member of her university’s board of directors questioned her academic record, and then brought it to the attention of the news media. It turned out that she had attended the University of Kansas but had not graduated, and that she had never attended Yale. The university fired Ms. Shin, who lost her other positions and left for the United States.
Questions arose about other prominent figures’ academic degrees. Some came forward to confess.
Among the dozen or so confirm!ed cheaters was Lee Chang-ha, an architect regularly featured on television. He was forced to give up his teaching job at Kimcheon Science College after saying he had received a degree from the department of fine arts at New Bridge University in Los Angeles. But New Bridge has no fine arts department.
The nationwide focus on academic fraud became so intense that it prompted Kim Ock-rang, the owner of a performing arts space, to avoid friends out of fear that her own lies about her academic record would be found out, she said in a television interview after her confession. Eventually, she resigned from her professorship at Dankook University in Seoul, after admitting that she had purchased her degree from a diploma mill in California.
In South Korea, degrees from top universities at home and abroad, especially in the United States, have a profound impact on everything from one’s career to marriage prospects.
South Korean children are pressured to study obsessively from an early age, often spending evenings and weekends in cram schools in preparation for entrance exams. And South Korean corporations rely heavily on diplomas to assess job applicants, though they have rarely bothered to check their authenticity.
But if more people are cheating to gain an advantage in a fierce job market, more are getting caught, particularly as people started posting anonymous tips about credentials fraud on Web sites and online bulletin boards.