In an attempt to revitalize the KAIST campus culture, President Kwang Hyung Lee initiated the QAIST New Student Culture Competition last year. The school plans to implement the ideas proposed by the winning teams. The KAIST Herald interviewed members of the Grand Prize winners, Stella Yolanda of KAInspire, and Jaymee Palma and Ada Carpenter of The Elementals.

1. Can you tell us a little bit about your award-winning idea?

Yolanda: KAInspire is a platform that invites KAIST students with various interests and backgrounds to share their stories and ideas with the community, and potentially to the world, through a 10-15 minute speech. Our main motto is “anyone can share, anyone can inspire”. Students can basically talk about anything: life stories, experiences, research, hobbies, etc.

Palma: Our idea for KAIST House Culture aims to create a better-connected KAIST community through the creation of “Houses”, which will serve as sources of information and advice, platforms for meeting new people, and hubs for discussion and collaboration. Inspired by the system popularized by the Harry Potter series, the student body will be split into six equal groups called Houses, to which they will be assigned upon enrollment. Through internal and inter-House activities, we expect the Houses to foster a sense of community and camaraderie within the KAIST community. We believe that this system will improve collaboration and socialization and create a long-lasting student tradition in KAIST. 

Carpenter: A big part of the proposal is the “House Cup”: students in the Houses will be awarded House points throughout the semester for academic achievement, extracurricular participation, or even volunteering. Then the House with the most points at the end will win a prize.

2. How did you come up with this idea? What was your inspiration?

Yolanda: We noticed that most KAIST students are not confident to ask questions and express their ideas. Also, they lack public speaking skills. Through this platform, we hope to bring out the best of KAIST students, allowing them to grow their potential, build their confidence, and learn more effectively by sharing their ideas with others. We also hope that listeners may gain more insights, view the world from a different perspective, and learn new things.

Palma: As a senior, I felt that I wasn’t able to meet or make friends with people outside of my existing social circles and that it was actually hard to do so, more so because of the pandemic. We realized that a lot of KAIST students felt the same way, and so we thought about creating a platform where students can meet, collaborate, and network with people from different departments and year levels.

Carpenter: I had a similar House system in my high school in the UK, and really enjoyed the atmosphere and events that it included. We also found that many US colleges including Harvard, Yale, and MIT have House systems, and so does GIST in Gwangju! Bringing a similar plan to KAIST and starting a tradition of togetherness and fun competition — run by students, for students — would be a great addition to the university.

3. Some effort has been made to bring KAIST students closer together before, such as freshman mentoring, Exciting College Life/Happy College Life classes, or buddy programs, but have not managed to bring significant changes. What do you think was the problem behind those efforts?

Palma: I think the main problem is that these programs are geared towards only freshmen. The support stops afterwards and only some departments have similar programs for students. It’s important to recognize that a lot of students need platforms for support and networking after freshman year since it’s harder to make and maintain friends outside of their departments or social circles. This is the problem that we tried to address with our idea.

Carpenter: Plus, a lot of these programs require students to actively sign up and choose to dedicate time to — which we all know is harder than it sounds for busy and stressed KAIST students. And to put it bluntly, the forced “fun” of the ECL/HCL classes is much less likely to improve student excitement and happiness than a system they can directly influence, and engage with as much as they actually want to.

4. How do you think your idea will be any different from previous efforts?

Palma: We designed this new culture to be led by students, from the House activities themselves to the administrative structure of the House Culture. So I think that this direct participation in how our idea gets implemented and how it can change based on feedback will be more effective in solving the problems with the social atmosphere in KAIST. 

Carpenter: When the House system is in full effect, it will include all undergraduate and graduate students — everyone would be assigned when they enter KAIST. This doesn’t mean they have to participate in every event, or even any at all, but they will always know the support system is there when they need it, and can take pride in the achievements of their House.

5. Do you think your ideas, when implemented, will be welcomed well by the student body? Or do you expect some friction? If so, does your plan address that?

Yolanda: We expect some [reluctance] from the students, so we plan to bring up success stories of “small stories that matter” to attract people to speak on stage, emphasize the importance of public speaking skills for their career, [and give out] certificates, awards, and monetary prizes.

Palma: We do expect that some students will not see the point of having Houses in KAIST, but through the surveys we conducted throughout the competition, we found that a lot of KAIST students liked our idea and [were] excited to participate. To address this, we proposed a preliminary voluntary implementation of our idea starting next spring to see if it’s a program that can be adopted universally. 

Carpenter: Starting anything new takes time and encouragement. But the House Culture is designed to be a long-term project that eventually will become an integral part of KAIST, and one that will constantly evolve depending on the input and participation of students. I hope the administration will actively support the realization of this future.

6. If you had the chance to change one thing about KAIST, aside from your award-winning idea, what would it be? 

Palma: I’d like to change and improve the barrier between international and Korean students! It’s a difficult thing to do, but I hope contests like this can bring good ideas to solve this issue.

Carpenter: Kitchen access for all! I think it would really improve students’ quality of life on campus, and I think it’s super unfair that currently only international students can use the one insufficient kitchen facility.