VALUE OF UNIVERSITIES

     What does going to university mean? Currently in Korean society, all high school students try to go to a certain university. And here, students at Korean Minjok Leadership Academy also spend three years of high school to go to the university, without much difference from other high school students in Korea. Why does college mean so much that we all try so hard to get to the top? 

     College is a place that offers study with expertise, and if there is anything you need to learn to achieve a particular dream, going to college is a very good choice. In terms of life, the majority of people recommend going to college because it is a place where they can meet new people and create new relationships. But what we want is not just a regular university. The places we want are those universities that everyone is surprised by - just a name that has high status. As one student who also wants to go to such a university, my position on the university is as follows.

     We all don't have to go to a high-ranking university. You don't even have to go to college. But you should know that the benefits of graduating from a good university certainly exist. The following example illustrates the greatest merit among them. If you don't go to college when you get a job at a company, or you graduate from a lesser university, you have to spend a lot of time and effort proving your abilities. On the other hand, if we leave Sky University, it is a place where we enter and graduate through a very difficult process, so we can proceed with some confidence, even if the former does not exert all the effort. Not just for the school's name value, but for the process of being accepted to the school - long, long years of patience, the achievements of exhaustive effort, and the overcoming of difficulties must be faced. Given this, it is clear that there is a reason to go to a university and that there are many things you can get when you go there. 

     To put it more directly, I think that only when an individual's will to go to college exists can he or she understand the meaning of university and make good use of it. There is no point in simply going to a university that your parents want or just going to the school chosen by the same group of friends around you in high school. If you are going to college for the benefit of the above-mentioned social aspects, that may be your own reason. However, if it is considered that graduating from college will bring stability to society, it cannot be the only  reason. Not only does it actually bring stability, due to the recent job shortage, but if aspirations do not exist, all of this is meaningless. 

     We cannot simply think of college as a goal in life, but as a step toward achieving our goal in life, so we can run toward a bigger dream. At least as much as my friends who are taking practical Korean language classes, I hope I can walk through my life with civic thinking, as a stepping stone to a more distant dream, rather than simply being tied up in a university only to live a decent life, regardless of whether I have a dream or not. ​​​​​​​

Though potatoes grow with tomatoes, they don't become tomatoes.  Potatoes are most beautiful when they shine in themselves, rather than when they are with all of the tomatoes. 
(Of course, the combination of French fries and tomato ketchup is acceptable.)