KAIST

Dual Degree Programs with TU Berlin

- Five students to be exchanged each year from this year, receive degrees from both schools
- Final stage of negotiation with GIT, UCSB
- On-going DDP negotiations with Delft University of Technology in Netherlands, Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden, Technical University of Denmark, Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Tsinghua University in China, Tokyo Institute of Technology
- DDPs with Ecole Polytechnique, INSA Lyon of France, and University of Karlsruhe of Germany underway at department levels

KAIST (President Nam-Pyo Suh) will begin Dual Degree Programs (DDP) with Technical University of Berlin (TU Berlin).

The both recently reached an accord on the implementation of DDP and will exchange maximum five students each year, starting this year. The DDP allows each school involved to exchange students who meet the counterpart’s requirements one-by-one with prior consensus of departments to accept the students and to confer its own diplomas on students who complete the prescribed graduation requirements.

TU Berlin, established in 1770, currently holds 28,344 enrolled students, among which 5,829 students are from abroad (over 20%) and provides lectures for more than 50 subjects in the fields of Humanities, Social Sciences, Economics and so on with its emphases on Natural Science and Engineering. TU Berlin has fostered a multitude of distinguished scientists, including 1986 Nobel Prize Recipient in Physics Ernst Ruska who developed an electronic microscope for the first time in the world.

KAIST has now been eagerly promoting the DDPs with many distinguished foreign universities. It is on the final stage of the DDP negotiation with Georgia Institute of Technology (GIT) and University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB), and has already agreed with Tsinghua University in China to implement the DDPs in several advanced fields. Also, an agreement with Tokyo Institute of Technology (TIT) is soon to be made.

With Ecole Polytechnique and INSA Lyon of France, and University of Karlsruhe of Germany, the negotiation is underway at department levels, and the DDPs are also being promoted with Milan Technical University of Italy, Delft University of Technology of Netherlands, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) of Sweden, Technical University of Denmark (DTU), Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NUNT).

“As global interests in East Asia arise, interests in KAIST by many foreign universities also increase. We are planning to expand the scope of this program to provide KAIST students with more opportunities of studying abroad and to attract more outstanding foreign students,” KAIST Dean of Academic Affairs Kwang-Hyung Lee explained.

- Dual Degree Program (DDP)
In DDP, schools involved can maintain their own curriculums and confer their own degrees on students who complete the graduation requirements. Therefore, students can receive degrees from both schools involved. Meanwhile, DDP is not the same concept with Joint Degree Program (JDP), in which schools involved establish a joint curriculum and confer a single joint degree on students.