North Korean leader Kim Jong Un issued an order for the top students in next year’s cohort of graduates from Kim Il Sung University to be automatically enrolled into the university’s three-year graduate (doctoral) programs. The order was issued on the eve of the eighth anniversary of his father Kim Jong Il’s death on Dec. 17.
As with other top universities in North Korea, Kim Il Sung University nominates the students with top scores in each department and places them in a special “elite” category.
There have been similar cases of compulsory graduate school enrollment for top students in the past. These “forced enrollments” have occurred at science and engineering schools such as Kim Chaek University of Technology and the Institute of Natural Science in Pyongyang. However, sources say that to enforce graduate school enrollment for all of the top scoring students in every department at North Korea’s top general university is unprecedented.
KEEPING THE “MOUNT RYONGNAM LINE” ALIVE
Sources explained that the order is likely linked to broader policies of the North Korean leadership to help cultivate the next generation of leadership.
“The move is also linked to the deeper aims of the Party, and its goal of selecting the top students at Kim Il Sung University—those who best embody the spirit of the ‘Mount Ryongnam line,’” one source explained. In other words, the underlying intent can be traced back to Kim Jong Un’s hopes that in these changing times, when youth are already five generations removed from the revolution, there will be those who step up to keep the spirit of the “Mount Ryonnam line” alive.
In North Korea, those who fought alongside Kim Il Sung against the Japanese colonial forces—that is, the first generation revolutionaries—and their children are referred to as the “Mount Paektu line.” Those who worked alongside Kim Jong Il during the years he established a monolithic ideological system and system of unitary leadership—that is, both classmates at Kim Il Sung University as well as graduates of the university who would later become top brass—are referred to as the “Mount Ryongnam line.” The moniker comes from Kim Il Sung University’s location at the foot of Mount Ryongnam, in the Taesong district of Pyongyang.
Amid gradual generational shifts, all of the above can be seen as part of a project to select an elite group of graduates from Kim Il Sung University to cultivate into future Party leaders.
“All of top graduates from each of the departments at Kim Il Sung University have become part of Kim Jong Un’s scheme, and their transcripts marked accordingly. Regardless of what they or their families want, they are now obligated to attend graduate school,” said a source.
MIXED REACTIONS FROM STUDENTS
This new policy has provoked a variety of reactions among the students of the university. Depending on where the students are from, these reactions generally fall into one of two camps. According to sources, the Pyongyang students due to graduate at the top of their class next year (March 2020) are at a loss: the recent measure has effectively thrown a wrench in their plans after graduation.
The top graduating students who originally hail from the provinces outside of Pyongyang, however, see this policy as an opportunity for social advancement. In their mind, explained sources, a degree from the graduate program of the university will guarantee that they will be able to live in Pyongyang.
Students with a four-year bachelor’s degree from Kim Il Sung University who also complete the three-year postgraduate program at the same university are generally placed in research positions or given professorships, guaranteeing them residency in Pyongyang.
However, there remain a few students from the provinces whose responses are more ambivalent, because of their difficult financial situation.
“For the past four years, students from the provinces have used up all the money their families could afford, and if they attend another three years of graduate school, they must ask their families for more money,” said a source. “Most of these students will try to get through their graduate school program by tutoring wealthy Pyongyang children or children near their university so they can eventually settle down in Pyongyang.”
*Translated by Violet Kim
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