According to the Ministry of Education, non-major selection will be expanded in the college entrance system in 2025. There are two ways to select students without a major. First, there is a free major program where students do not have to decide on a major. However, they can freely select all majors except for special departments within the university. Additionally, there is a method of recruiting students by department or college and then selecting a major.
To put it simply, the non-major system is a scheme in which universities select first-year students regardless of major and have them choose a major in their second year. This ensures that students have the right to decide their major. They will be able to study more flexibly by overcoming barriers between majors. However, if the non-major selection system is expanded, there are concerns that new students will focus on popular departments. As a result, there is a possibility that unpopular departments may disappear. In addition, if they do not enter their desired major in thier second year, the dropout rate will likely increase.
The Yeungnam Observer asked students who were autonomous majors in their first year what they thought about the non-major selection system. As a result, most of them were of the opinion that it would be good because they were satisfied with their choice of major in their second year. There were cases where they were not interested in a department before enrolling. However, after studying there for a year, they became interested and ended up going there. On the other hand, when The Observer asked students who had not selected a major, they felt a little regretful about entering the general department. Also, they thought it was an excellent thing. As mentioned earlier, some students were concerned about the number of students in unpopular departments.
