Undergraduate Current Students | Yonsei University

About Yonsei University

As the oldest university in Korea, Yonsei University traces its roots back to April 10, 1885, when, by Royal Decree, King Kojong opened the first modern hospital. Yonsei University was established in 1957 when Yonsei University and the Severance Union Medical College and Hospital were formally united, and the new institution was renamed as Yonsei University, derived from the first two syllables of the two institutions. Yonsei is particularly fortunate to have a spacious and well-wooded campus located just 20 minutes away from the economic, political, and cultural centers of the Seoul metropolitan area. It has 18 graduate schools, 19 colleges, and 111 subsidiary institutions. With its student body comprised of the top 1 percent of high school graduates in Korea, Yonsei University is proud of its long history as the leading institution of higher education in Korea, as well as of its reputation as the most international university in Korea. The University has over 36,000 undergraduate students and over 1,500 full time faculty members.

Term Dates

Yonsei University offers IBEX opportunities in fall and spring semesters.

• Fall semester: mid-August to mid-December
• Spring semester: mid-February to mid-June

Dates are approximate and may be subject to change.

Housing and Living Costs

• Housing: on-campus housing is offered on a first-come, first-serve basis and is not guaranteed. Prices ranges between KRW 1,456,000 – 2,565,000/semester.
• Meals: approximately KRW 2,000,000/semester.
• Books: approximately KRW 150,000 – 250,000/semester.
• Transportation: approximately KRW 400,000/semester
• Insurance: per government policy, all international students will be
  automatically enrolled in the Korea National Health Insurance upon receiving
  their alien registration number after arriving in Korea. The estimated cost for
  this insurance is around USD $50-60/month.
• Visa: the application fee is approximately USD $45.

KRW = South Korean won

Find out more about IBEX tuition, housing and other logistics.

Language of Instruction

English and Korean

Student Services

The student services available to exchange students include:

• International Buddy Program
• Activities organized by the Division of International Education and Exchange
• Student clubs and organizations 

Academic Information

If you are accepted to IBEX, you will attend two individual advising meetings to plan and revise your schedule: one with NYU Stern Academic Advising and one with the NYU Stern IBEX team. As you build your academic schedule for your semester abroad, carefully review and consider the following course information. Please note that Yonsei requires a minimum 3.0 GPA for all exchange students.

IBEX Course Information

• You may take a full semester of business classes while abroad on IBEX.
• Note that the NYU credits you receive for a course are based on the conversion above not the amount of credits you receive if you take the course on NYU's campus (as an example Texts and Ideas equivalent do not automatically transfer back as 4 credits).
• Leave room for at least two general electives in your schedule. This allows you to:
  • Take interesting, location-specific courses not offered at Stern, and
  • Have more flexibility during the course registration process.
• Reference the IBEX Course Guide: What you can or cannot take.
  • You can take a maximum of two classes per concentration.
  • Accounting courses cannot be taken for credit toward the Accounting or CPA majors/concentrations.
  • All IBEX grades will transfer back to NYU Stern as Pass/Fail.

Yonsei Pre-Approved Courses

• Review the list of Yonsei Pre-Approved courses via the link below. The courses listed on this sheet were taken previously by Stern IBEX students and have already been approved for a specific NYU equivalent.
• There is no guarantee that the courses listed here will be offered during the specific semester you study abroad. It is important to be flexible. Have a Plan A and Plan B and the space to take some electives.
• If a course is already on this pre-approved list, it does not need to be reviewed again - unless you want to see if it will count towards a new requirement.

**Please note that exchange students have encountered challenges enrolling in computer science, data science, and artificial intelligence courses due to limited availability. As with all topics, it is very important to continue to be as flexible as possible when selecting courses.

Finding New Courses

• You are not limited to only taking the courses listed on the spreadsheet.
• If you see a course on Yonsei’s website that you would like to take, but is not listed below, you must submit the syllabus to Stern’s Global Experiences team for approval.
• Once Yonsei publishes its confirmed courses for the semester you will be attending, you can revise your list as needed based on what is being offered.