Browsing by Subject "Korea"
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Item The adoption and outcomes of ISO 14001 across Korean business firms(2014-07) Baek, KyungminEnvironmental sociologists and organizational scholars have recently been interested in the origins of voluntary environmental programs and their various outcomes. Similarly, this dissertation examines the adoption of ISO 14001 known as the most famous voluntary environmental program and its consequence in the Korean context. More specifically, I situate the motivation to adopt ISO 14001 and its various outcomes in the context of two theoretical frameworks: resource-based view and institutional theory. I begin by using event-history modeling to examine firms' adoption of ISO 14001 in Korea between 1996 and 2011. I find that both resource-based and institutional factors have influenced the diffusion of ISO 14001. By exploring time-related effects, I also find that while resource-based factors are important in the early periods of the diffusion, institutional factors become important in the later periods of the diffusion. I then explore the effects of ISO 14001 on pollutant emissions among facilities in Korea from 2004 to 2011. Using data from the Toxic Release Inventory (TRI) program of Korea, I find that the adoption of ISO 14001 does not affect the changes of emission performance from 2004 to 2011. This finding indicates that ISO 14001 has been adopted as a symbol to show off organizational commitment to societal requests for environmental responsibility, but not as an instrument to become greener. Moreover, this finding suggests that the institutional context favorable to the diffusion of ISO 14001--in particular, the Korean government's active involvement in the diffusion of ISO 1400--is not likely to lead to the improvement in environmental quality. I conclude the dissertation with a discussion of what these two studies tell us about corporate social responsibility in Korea and, broadly, East Asia.Item Comparing Preservice and Early Career Teachers' Perceptions of Elementary Music Teacher Education Practices: A Mixed Methods Study(2018-01) Choi, Jung WonElementary school music experiences have been shown to be influential for lifelong music engagement, and sound music teacher education would be the most effective way to provide positive school music experiences to students in elementary schools. In spite of this importance, many countries have different elementary music education and music teacher education practices based on their cultural values and educational priorities. The purpose of this study is to compare music teacher education practices for elementary schools in South Korea with those in the upper Midwest region of the United States by investigating preservice and early career elementary music teachers’ perceptions of their own music teacher education programs, self-perceptions of competence, and their suggestions for improvement. This Sequential Explanatory Mixed Methods study, which involved survey data in Phase I and interviews in Phase II, attempts to unravel the reasons behind these teachers’ perceptions and to approach a middle ground for elementary school music teacher education by recommending some practical ways to improve in two very distinctive contexts. The quantitative and qualitative results reveal that US teachers were mostly satisfied with their training, while the majority of the Korean teachers expressed great disappointment. Teachers in both countries expressed some degree of concern regarding the grade level preparation and appreciated their training courses and student teaching practicum when those were practical and related to pedagogy. In addition, their experiences in university courses and student teaching were greatly dependent on course instructors and cooperating teachers they met. In terms of a level of confidence in music teaching, the US teachers showed higher levels of confidence than did the Korean teachers, and their levels of confidence were highly related to their perceptions regarding the institutional performance addressing knowledge and skills that are necessary and relevant to the music teachers’ needs. Participants, regardless of their teaching experience level and their satisfaction, agreed that teachers who have enough music training and proper understanding of elementary school children should teach music in elementary schools, although the current status of each country was different, and the degrees of agreement were varied. In addition, while many US teachers wanted to have a prescribed curriculum as a guideline to ensure effective music teaching, every single Korean respondent preferred to have a prescribed curriculum, revealing the long educational convention and the current situation. Teachers in the US especially critiqued insufficient elementary school level consideration and practicality in their program. Their perceptions revealed the weaknesses in training elementary music specialists under the choral/instrumental track system for broad K-12 certification. On the other hand, although training in Korea was targeted to the elementary school level, the Korean music education major does not seem to function effectively to train elementary school level experts due to a lack of enough music expertise, practicality, and pedagogical support. Based on the teachers’ suggestions for improvement, some realistic remedies were proposed to find a middle ground such as enhancing music methods courses in terms of pedagogical content and practicality, increasing interrelation between the field experiences and university training courses, utilizing veteran elementary music teachers as music education faculty and cooperating teachers, and offering more accessible and organized professional development opportunities to elementary in-service teachers. The ultimate beneficiary of these improvements would be elementary school children who would have increased chances of getting a quality music education in their early and critical years.Item The Effect of Free Trade Agreement (FTA) on Small Open Economics: Implications for the Korea - US (KORUS) FTA(2012) Lee, Sungkook; Tadesse, BedassaGiven that the KORUS / Korea-EU agreement has not been long put into effect and Korea-China agreement is not ratified, in order to extrapolate the effect of the KORUS FTA on Korea, the study explores simulation of economic effects of free trade agreements between Korea and advanced economies in the recent past. Combining results from previous research, the study draws economic effects and implications of KORUS FTA on Korea. In general, the Korean economy will achieve a quantitative economic expansion to a greater or lesser degree through KORUS FTA. We can find similar results on the research of KOREU and Korean-China FTA. FTA between a relative smaller open economy and a bigger market economy will give a driving force of economic growth on the functioning of the relatively small and open economies.Item The new landscape of Korean higher education: institutional and personal factors influencing intercultural competence.(2009-08) Jon, Jae-EunThis dissertation research examines the impact of institutional and personal factors on the development of Korean university students' intercultural competence in Korean higher education. It is based on the context of significant change in demographics within Korean higher education from a rapidly increasing influx of international students, as well as emergent diversity within Korean society. For these purposes, this research employed a two-phase mixed-methods design, in which the quantitative and qualitative data were collected and analyzed. The quantitative results from correlation, regression, and path analyses demonstrate that an institutional factor--participation in intervention programs that bring Korean and international students together in a structured and supportive environment --plays an important role in promoting Korean students' intercultural interactions with international students, as well as developing their intercultural competence. One personal factor in particular-- intercultural interaction--has a direct influence on higher levels of intercultural competence. On the other hand, the institutional factor and another personal factor--prior international experience-- contribute indirectly to intercultural competence by influencing intercultural interaction itself. The qualitative findings from in-depth interviewing describe the nature of intercultural interactions between Korean and international students in terms of: the experience of developing intercultural friendship; the importance of reciprocity in these relationships; and the value of having a shared experience among students. Not only do these findings provide empirical support for the theoretical orientation in this research--the contact hypothesis--but they also provide empirical evidence for the concept of "Internationalization at Home" (Wächter, 2003) by demonstrating the benefits of internationalization for domestic students who remain in their home countries. It particularly emphasizes understanding and promoting mutually beneficial relationships between mobile and non-mobile students in relation to the internationalization of higher education. Furthermore, this research carries important implications for Korean society in educating college students to live and work with culturally diverse people in its emergent multicultural milieu. Lastly, this research presents suggestions for policy and practice for higher education institutions to implement in developing intervention programs for student intercultural interaction and intercultural competence development.Item Pharmacists’ Roles and Factors Affecting Patient Care in Korea(University of Minnesota, College of Pharmacy, 2015) Hwang, Monica J.; Young, Henry N.Objectives: This study was conducted to explore Korean community pharmacists’ perceptions of their roles in providing care to patients after the implementation of the Separation of Prescribing and Dispensing Act (SPD Act) and to investigate pharmacists’ perceptions about factors that impact their patient care. Methods: Eight community pharmacists participated in semi-structured, face-to-face, in-depth interviews in Korea. A snowball sampling technique was used to obtain participants. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed. Interviews were analyzed using a summative content analysis procedure. Key findings: Participants’ perceptions of their roles centered on dispensing prescriptions, educating and counseling patients, and helping patients with OTC products. Participants perceived time constraints due to prescription volume and patient expectations as factors influencing their provision of patient care. Conclusion: This study suggests that the SPD Act was successful in changing pharmacists’ roles in the Korean health care system. None of the participants perceived their role to include prescribing, while all of the participants indicated that their primary role was to dispense medications. Future research should examine the pervasiveness of the themes identified in this study across Korean community pharmacy practice in order to generalize the impact of the SPD Act.Item Presenting Korea's Past: Melodrama, Spectacle, and Democracy in Post-2000 Historical Films(2020-10) Dozier, Saena“Presenting Korea’s Past: Melodrama, Spectacle, and Democracy in Post-2000 Historical Films” examines the revival of the cinematic genre of sagŭk in South Korea in the 2000s. The diegesis of sagŭk film portrays premodern dynastic eras of Korea. This project analyzes the evolution of the genre by genealogically tracing its rise and fall and investigates determinants of the genre’s consequential comeback since the new millennium. Built upon film scholar Linda Williams’ exposition of “a space of innocence” and Rick Altman’s genre theory, this dissertation argues that a powerful nostalgic imagination of innocence exists within the genre and suggests that the newly articulated innocence is one of the determinants of the revival of genre. However, the specific nature of innocence and how it is delivered varies. This dissertation demonstrates that because of an intensification of globalization and resistance to late capitalism, innocence is less associated with nationhood and national identity but more associated with a universalistic and utopian way of existing within a collective community. “Presenting Korea’s Past” concludes that the genre is a site of constant struggle among the producing powers and consumers and that the spectators are the main agents of the genre’s transformation.