As part of our 50 Years of KAIST Feature, The KAIST Herald interviewed KAIST students, alumni professors, foreign professors, and administrative staff to get their insights on how much KAIST has changed over the years, their memories of KAIST, and what they think KAIST should focus on in the future.

Can you briefly introduce yourself?

My name is Mik Fanguy. I’m going to make 20 years in KAIST in June, and I think it’s the longest for any foreign faculty member in KAIST. I teach in the School of Humanities and Social Sciences in the EFL department. I primarily teach writing, but I also teach a graduate english presentation course, just helping people communicate their research in writing or presentation.

Why did you choose to come to KAIST?

When I was a graduate student in the US, I was in Southern Illinois University. I had a lot of Korean friends, and I needed a job after I completed my degree. At that time, I feel like KAIST was not all that internationally well-known, especially to people outside of science and engineering. But of course, domestically, it was very famous. I benefited from the inside knowledge there. When I got a job offer from KAIST, as well as other places, my Korean friends were absolutely adamant that I go to KAIST. But I didn’t know anything about Daejeon; I came over expecting to be here for a year, and as you can see, I’m still here. 

What would you say was the motivation or the reason that helped you stay here for such a long time?

It was so much better than I ever expected because, first of all, we have such a nice campus. It was more technologically modern than the university I was working for in the US. They gave me a nice office; all the conditions were good; I really liked the students. One thing that made me stay was that I was making year by year contracts, and the contracts were all signed around this time of the year, usually around April. And it was very hard to decide to leave around that season, it’s very beautiful here at that time. When I got to KAIST, there were very few foreign faculty and students at that time. So there were a lot of things I could do to get involved and help the university. I started working with the International Relations Team (IRT), pretty much straight away. At that time the new president of KAIST was the head of International Relations, so I got a chance to work with President Lee. We had a great time building international cooperation and international partnerships with US universities. I started working for the Herald right away; I was the English advisor for a number of years. So there were a lot of ways to get involved just because there was a shortage of foreign people, and so I felt needed. I felt that I could contribute, and it was hard to walk away from that from year one. 

Do you remember your first day at KAIST? What was your first impression?

That was not a great day for me, actually. I didn’t speak any Korean and I didn’t know what I was doing. Nowadays we have the ISSS office and all these support staff, but at the time there were not enough foreigners. And I remember arriving at the KAIST campus by taxi, and I [was walking around with] two suitcases with wheels. And it was the middle of June — [it was] very hot. I was looking for my housing, trying to ask anybody to give me directions. I walked all over campus and most people would never speak to me. I think the level of English at that time was definitely a lot lower, seeing a foreigner was a lot weirder than it is now. And I think I was lost — this is funny to say — I was lost for three hours. And that was a terrible introduction to the university for me. Because of that, I made the IRT faculty/student handbooks that had maps; I worked on that book with the IRT and we would update it every year. And it was because of that I became the co-chair of the International Faculty Council, and we try to welcome new foreign faculty and help orient them, sometimes even before they even come to Korea, to help them know what to do. So that’s been an important cause for me because my first day didn’t set me up with the right impression. 

What’s your favorite change or addition to KAIST campus since you’ve been here?

When I first came to KAIST, there was so much more grass, and literally, there were half as many buildings. [It] was incredible — we used to see Indian students playing cricket in some of these big grassy areas that are no longer there. So it’s a tough one, because I miss the wide open spaces. But I would say the best one is the new library. I’ve really not been in many libraries that I liked better than that — it’s such a design marvel, inside and out. I think it’s also the feature building of KAIST. Kudos to KAIST for that library! 

What is your best memory at KAIST?

One thing that I did in KAIST was the KAIST Podcast, for about five years. For me, that podcast was a really special experience because I got to talk to a lot of the greatest people at KAIST about the greatest things that were being done at KAIST. It’s hard to pick one thing — I got to talk to dozens of professors about what they were doing. I got to talk to Dr. Oh about HUBO, before and after the DARPA competition. I also got to talk to six Nobel Prize winners that visited the campus and just some of the leading experts in science and engineering. That, to me, was the thing that I was most excited about — it was a good project, I really enjoyed it. 

How has KAIST changed for foreign students and staff in the time you were here?

The biggest thing is language, because nowadays almost everything you need to read or see is given in English as well as Korean — when I first came, that was not the case. You can imagine how difficult that could be; nowadays we have technologies like Google Translate [to] instantly translate and get 90% of the information right. Back then, all the information was coming at you in Korean and it was very difficult to understand what was going on. My classes were (obviously) all taught in English, but most other classes were not. The level of English in the campus was low — the average student was not that great in English, and a lot of the faculty members even had limited English. A lot of [people] were unhappy when we switched to English curriculum, but as a result, everyone’s English has gotten really good, everyone’s speaking better and better. And I think it’s making KAIST a lot more globally competitive. Even though it’s difficult, I think it’s beneficial for KAIST overall. 

The other thing is there’s more foreign people around. When I first arrived, if there was a foreign person, I could pretty much guarantee you that I knew exactly who that person was — their name, where they’re from, their major, what they were doing… I would certainly shake their hands and talk to that person. I kept that attitude for as long as I could; now there’s so many foreign people. I think there was a period of time where I got a little bit weird, saying hello to everybody — that was just the way it was when I first got here, but at some point that’s changed because there’s so many foreigners. So I think there was that period of time when people thought I was a crazy person. I think the university is also much more able to be aware of and take care of us a little better, to make the offices like ISSS — we didn’t have that back then. 

How much do you think KAIST has globalized compared to 20 years ago?

I don’t know how to quantify it, but [I would say quite a bit]. There’s the English [aspect] — when I receive emails, if it’s not in English I usually imagine it’s not for me. I couldn’t have done that in 2001. The [students’ level] of English is higher compared to before... I think it’s still a long way from being a truly global campus, but it’s getting there. And then again, part of the charm of Korea itself and KAIST is that it’s not entirely multicultural. It does hold this special status in the world in a way; it’s very original and it hasn’t changed that much compared to other countries — and I think there’s good and bad to that. The good is we can really see what local life is like, particularly in Daejeon, and see the culture. 

What do you think is the most important thing KAIST should focus on in the next few years (short-term) and in the next 50 years (long-term)?

One thing that concerns me is that, unfortunately, we’ve struggled to keep our international faculty around. I think there’s still some things about living in Korea that can be hard for foreign people. KAIST is doing a great job attracting foreign talent, in terms of both students and professors, but I think that we have to think about how to retain [them] here so that they never leave. We need to look at what we can do to entice them to be here so we can maintain our international status and keep these foreign talents [who] can give us a new perspective. That would be my unsolicited advice to the university. 

[For the long term], I don’t have a good answer for that, because I saw the university come from being domestically famous to being a place where people abroad are aware of it. Back when I started, KAIST’s long term goal was to become more global and internationally recognized, and they keep hitting the mark. I think there doesn’t need to be any big change here — what we need is to stay in this path, to keep making these lofty goals and achieve them one by one.