Ajou News

NEW LINC+ Project Group Vows to Provide Active Business Support through AEIN

  • 2021-02-23
  • 2837

With the aim of providing new and more effective forms of support for businesses in line with today’s contactless trend, Ajou University became the first higher education institution in Korea to open a cyber training academy for university-affiliated businesses, offering online programs for employees and executives.


The Leaders in Industry-University Cooperation (LINC+) Project Group at Ajou University recently announced that it opened the Ajou E-Innovation Net (AEIN) to provide the four major types of training and education required by law to employees and executives of the 1,500 or so university-affiliated businesses. The LINC+ Project Group coordinates exchanges between the university and affiliated businesses, promoting mutual growth and partnership.


Businesses operating in Korea with five or more employees each are required by law to provide four types of education and training at least once a year to promote workplace safety and security. These sessions are education and training on sexual harassment, personal information and privacy, occupational safety and health, and disability awareness. Although all workers have the right to receive education and training on these subjects, small businesses struggle to develop and provide them on their own due to the costs involved.


To help address this issue, the LINC+ Project Group opened AEIN, the first initiative of its kind ever attempted by a higher education institution in Korea, in October last year to provide trial classes for members of Ajou-affiliated businesses. In partnership with Edu-M, a local agency that certifies lifelong education programs, the group has established a platform that is accessible from anywhere at any time and launched eight programs so far, including those on occupational safety and health.


AEIN is interfaced with the LINC+ Project Group’s directory of university-affiliated businesses and keeps real-time records on the classes applied for and completed by trainees. Trainees can also print online certificates upon completing each program. Over 1,100 employees and executives of Ajou-affiliated businesses have completed their training in just two months since AEIN’s opening. The university has provided all of these programs for free.


The LINC+ Project Group intends to expand the range of programs on offer at AEIN and also improve the platform to provide mobile training courses accessible via smartphone. A broader array of programs aside from the required ones, such as those on the themes of workplace bullying, retirement pensions, and taxes, are now in development.


In addition, the group intends to develop other platforms for online learning, including online seminars and cyber libraries, to help businesses partnered with Ajou University. The university’s goal is to develop and provide quality training content to businesses participating in student internship programs, subsidiaries of Ajou’s technology holding companies, companies in need of trainees, and other such businesses so as to generate a new stream of revenue from quality paid-for contents introduced over time.


Oh Yeong-tae, Executive Vice President for University-Industry Cooperation, commented: “Our goal is to provide quality education and training services for affiliated and partner businesses through AEIN. Going forward, we will continue developing new measures to strengthen and continue our cooperation with industries.”


# Go to AEIN: https://ajou_aein.edumit.co.kr/studyCenter/.