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| Gregory Hill, new chief administrative officer and dean of faculty at the University of Utah Asia Campus (UAC) in Songdo, Incheon/ Courtesy of University of Utah Asia Campus |
By Kim Se-jeong
For students who had planned to head to the U.S. to complete their higher education, the COVID-19 pandemic has made that goal more difficult to achieve. However, Gregory Hill, the new chief administrative officer of the University of Utah Asia Campus (UAC) in Songdo, Incheon, said UAC could be of help to such students as it offers a U.S. education on Korean soil.
"We have a U.S experience right here in front of them in Korea. One of the things that as we are out recruiting that we are telling our future students is, 'Look, You don't have to go to the United States,'" Hill said during a recent interview with The Korea Times.
"You can have that experience right here and then three years from now when things have hopefully calmed down, you will still get the opportunity to go to the U.S. and have that educational experience. In the meantime, you can do it right here in Korea where it's safe and where they are very careful about managing the COVID-19 situation. They can do it here in Korea."
Opened in 2014, the UAC is the University of Utah's first expanded campus offering five bachelor degree programs in psychology, communication, urban ecology, civil engineering, and film and media arts, and two graduate degrees in public health and bioinformatics.
The university's opening in Songdo was possible thanks to Incheon Global Campus (IGC), an initiative by the Korean government and Incheon Metropolitan City to make the city a global education hub in Northeast Asia and to nurture talented young students in education, economics, industry, culture and art.
The UAC currently has 670 enrolled students and 100 alumni. The University of Utah in the U.S. has 32,000 students enrolled. Among the outstanding alumni are Ed Catmull, co-founder and president of Pixar Animation Studios and president of Disney Feature Animation, and Kim Sang-wan, a professor of pharmaceutics and pharmaceutical chemistry and founder of the Center for Controlled Chemical Delivery.
Graduating from Texas A&M University in 2006, Hill was an associate professor of public policy and administration at Boise State University in the U.S. In 2018, he taught summer courses at the UAC.
A little over a month into the job, Hill said he would like to focus on strengthening the student experience.
"The most important thing I feel for a successful university is that the students have an experience where it is second to none, where they become part of the University of Utah so that it is in their hearts."
Along with that, he would also like to strengthen faculty opportunities and improve community engagement.
Financial independence is a challenge facing the UAC, but Hill was confident that the UAC can achieve it.
"We want to organize a student research symposium where they can present their research and can show it off and we can advertise that to whoever wants to look at it. That will give us the chance to build a solid financial foundation."
The UAC is temporarily receiving financial support from the IGC.
Hill is married to a Korean American wife, and they have three children.
"My children are able to come now and experience a part of their heritage that they otherwise hadn't been able to experience," he noted.
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