Deadline: 10-Sep-2025
The Korea Foundation provides financial support for the creation of new professorships in the fields of Korean studies and Korean language at universities outside Korea that are equipped with the necessary infrastructure to maintain an adequate level of Korean studies research and education and have future growth potential.
This program aims to support universities that will fund and continuously maintain a newly established Korean studies professorship from its own resources after the conclusion of the KF’s support, or through a jointly created endowment fund.
In addition, the universities should ensure that the holder of the professorship will be appointed and promoted through a thorough and fair review of his/her qualifications and accomplishments in accordance with the university’s procedures for appointment, promotion, and tenure for faculty members. Under this program, the KF funds the establishment of two types of professorships:
- Tenure-track positions, which recipient universities shall continuously maintain from their own resources after the termination of the KF’s initial support,
- Endowed chair positions, which are financed through an endowment fund jointly created by the KF and recipient universities.
Details of Support
- Tenure-Track Position (TTP): The KF provides up to 70% of the total amount of the salary and employee benefits for the TTP professor of Korean studies/Korean language to be hired by the support recipient university.
- Salary: the hired professor’s salary in accordance with the existing professor salary table of the support recipient university.
- Employee benefits: the non-wage payments, such as fringe benefits and social welfare expenses, that an employer is required to pay to his/her employees according to the laws and regulations of the state or country to which the support recipient university belongs.
- Endowed Chair Position: The KF provides an endowment on an annual basis during the grant period for the new establishment of a permanent professorship in Korean studies/Korean language, on the condition that the support recipient university provides a matching fund contribution of 50% on a dollar-for-dollar basis.
Grant Period
- Three to five years.
Eligibility Criteria
- Universities outside of Korea that plan to create new professorships in Korean studies/Korean language.
- Eligibility Requirements for the Appointee to a Korean Studies Professorship:
- Focus on Korea in more than 50% of his/her research and teaching activities, and conduct such research using primary sources published in the Korean language.
- Publish the findings of such research in the English language, and possibly in the Korean language.
- Be proficient in the Korean language.
Application Requirements
- Online application:
- Information about current status of Korean studies of the applicant institution (including existing faculty members, courses, library collections, and academic activities in Korean studies/Korean language at the university) is required.
- Supplementary materials (to be uploaded with the online application):
- Curriculum for B.A./M.A. in Korean studies (and/or Korean language) degree programs (if applicable)
- Information about the university’s salary scale for professors
- Curriculum vitae of the professor to be hired (only if the university has a concrete candidate in mind at the time of application)
- Curriculum vitae of the project director
- Letter from Dean of the faculty that plans to establish the professorship in Korean studies
For more information, visit Korea Foundation.