Workshop
Academic Mobility in the Times of the Pandemic

Science cooperation can make our lives better and is the essence of academic life at institutions like Seoul National University and its Graduate School of Public Administration, which has been a long-standing partner for the Hanns Seidel Foundation. Therefore, we were honored to organize a workshop at the Knowledge Center for Public Administration and Policy to speak about knowledge sharing, academic mobility, and the impact of the pandemic. The workshop also served as the first non-remote event since the newly eased COVID-19 regulations allowed it, with regards to social distancing rules and some attendees joining in remotely.

After the workshop was opened by Professor Jung Kwangho, department of Public Policy Process and Comparative Health Policy at the GSPA, Dr. Seliger, representant of the Hanns Seidel Foundation, thanked the GSPA in his own opening remarks for their longstanding relation and then addressed the current situation regarding knowledge sharing and the COVID pandemic. He emphasized on the importance of scientific cooperation and trust in shared knowledge, especially medical advances, now - in the face of a pandemic - even more than usually.

The main part of the workshop was being held by Dr. Tomasz Wierzbowski, who promotes the exchange of researchers between Europe and the rest of the world, in particular in Korea, and who spoke about the EU science and technology policy and, in particular, the European programs on science and technology cooperation. His focus was on the introduction of the Euraxess Program, a joint initiative of over 40 European countries funded by the European Union, that has taken the step to the worldwide stage with the goal to link Europe to the world. The Euraxess Korea Program has been launched in 2018 and helps Korean researchers get in contact with Europe to promote exchange, search for potential research collaborators or hosts and find funding for mobility projects.

His presentation was followed by additional remarks by the designated discussants Prof. Juhyeon Go, who teaches at Yonsei University, and Dr. Hayan Lee from HUFS, who are both specialists in the area of European affairs. The workshop was concluded by a Q&A style discussion round.

Being able to share thoughts about the important topic of science cooperation, knowledge sharing and academic mobility, and especially to do so in person rather remotely as COVID regulations had demanded until now, was a great opportunity for the Hanns Seidel Foundation as well as the workshop participants.