North Korea’s foreign funded university launches online video series
Web series to showcase life inside Pyongyang's foreign funded elite academic institution
The Pyongyang University of Technology (PUST) has launched an online video series showcasing life and facilities at the institution, according to a press release issued on Wednesday.
The series has so far featured one video and will aim to reveal aspects of and within the university on a monthly basis.
“Pyongyang University of Science and Technology (PUST) is inviting you to glimpse life at PUST through a new video series, PUST Stories,” the press release read.
The press release accompanied the inaugural video in the series, which featured an interview with female PUST student Kim Mi Hyang.
Kim, a recent graduate of Pyongyang Middle School number 1, is a freshman at PUST and is studying English. Pyongyang Middle-School Number 1 is among the most elite schools in the country, with former leader Kim Jong Il attending Pyongyang Senior-Middle School Number 1.
PUST, previously an all-male university, only recently accepted its first female students in April 2015 with the announcement that 10 female students would be enrolling at the graduate level.
PUST is the first foreign-funded university in North Korea and is operated in partnership between the North Korean government and the YUST PUST Foundation, a faith-based nonprofit organization.
The school provides an English-language education to members of Pyongyang’s student elite and is staffed primarily by teachers from overseas, including from the United States.
“When I first saw the foreign professors, I never saw many professors before, so I was nervous,” Kim says in the video. Although an English student Kim said she would like to study biology in order to one day become a doctor.
“In our country there is a speech like this … ‘keep your feet planted on the group and your eyes open to the world’, so here maybe in the future, maybe next year I can see the science of the world then I can say thank you very much for realizing my dream to my motherland,” she said.
Kim also spoke about daily life at the university, including living with her classmates in the dormitories, playing sports in free time and how she misses her mother.
“June will bring another glimpse — this time of the PUST Dental Clinic, which is located on campus, and the Dental School, which is the first school to begin classes in PUST’s Division of Medical Sciences (DMS),” the press release read.
PUST is an institution reserved for children from elite families and has been the subject of curiosity given its staffing of foreign teachers and the religious links to the university in a country that has a consistently low religious freedom ranking.
PUST has been the subject of a BBC Panorama documentary as well as a 2014 book by journalist Suki Kim titled, Without You, There is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea’s Elite, in which the author recounted her time at the university working undercover as a teacher.
PUST has been the subject of a BBC Panorama documentary as well as a 2014 book by journalist Suki Kim titled, Without You, There is No Us: My Time with the Sons of North Korea’s Elite, in which the author recounted her time at the university working undercover as a teacher.
Featured Image: PUST by uritours on 2012-05-21 02:18:38
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