1. History

Yonsei can trace its history back to 1885 with the founding of Gwanghyewon, Korea's first Western hospital, by Horace Newton Allen, an American Protestant missionary. In the early 1900s, Gwanghyewon was later renamed Severance Medical School, and finally merged with Yonhi College (formerly Chosun Christian College) in 1955, to become Yonsei University.

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2. It’s extremely hard to get in

Only the cream of the academic crop can pass through Yonsei’s hallowed halls. While Yonsei’s acceptance rates aren’t published, it’s generally thought that in Korea, you’ll need to be in at least the top two per cent of students to be accepted. International students with good grades stand a 40 per cent chance of being accepted, according to the Global Scholarships blog.

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3. Yonsei boasts three scenic campuses

Yonsei has campuses in three locations: Incheon – where the Songdo campus is located –Wonju and the main Seoul campus in Sinchon.

The Wonju campus is around 97km (60 miles) from Seoul, and is surrounded by forest, mountains and a lake. While it accepts international students, most choose to attend the main campus or the international campus at Incheon.

Jolie-Pitt will be spending his first year at Yonsei’s Songdo campus.

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4. The campuses are often featured in Korean movies and dramas

K-drama fans will recognise three iconic buildings, Stimson Hall, Appenzeller Hall and Underwood Hall. These beautiful Gothic, plant-covered stone buildings and the gardens around them have been featured on camera in Abyss, Reply 1994, Romance is a Bonus Book, Iris, The Classic, and My Sassy Girl.

In Reply 1994, the whole cast studied at Yonsei. In Romance is a Bonus Book, Cha Eun-ho (played by Lee Jong-suk) lectures on Yonsei’s campus, renamed Hankuk University in the drama.

In My Sassy Girl’s famous high heels scene, Yonsei’s halls were where The Girl (played by Jun Ji-hyun) swaps shoes with the hapless Gyeon-woo (played by Cha Tae-hyun).

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5. Famous students and alumni

Yonsei boasts many notable students and alumni who dominate in their respective fields.

Winner of the Man Booker International Prize 2016, author Han Kang studied Korean Literature during her time at Yonsei, while retired gymnast Son Yeon-jae – a gold medal winner at both the Asian Games and Asian Championships – was enrolled in the Department of Sport and Leisure Studies. Son graduated in 2019 and now runs her own rhythmic gymnastics studio.

Notable alumni include Han Seung-soo, former prime minister and former president of the 56th session of the General Assembly of the United Nations, who graduated from the Department of Political Science and International Studies.

Celebrity alumni include JYP Entertainment founder Park Jin-young, who is responsible for earworms like Wonder Girls’ Nobody, and prolific film director Bong Joon-ho. Bong majored in sociology, while in comparison, Park studied something totally unrelated to his current career – geology. Meanwhile Lu Han, a former member of K-pop boy band EXO, was a language exchange student before being scouted by his former management agency, SM Entertainment.

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6. Yonsei has a fierce rivalry with Korea University

Much like the competition between the UK’s Oxford and Cambridge, students at Yonsei and Korea University consider themselves arch-rivals in both academics, and a fierce annual sports competition that dates back to 1923. Five sports teams face off in football, baseball, rugby, basketball and ice hockey. Yonsei students don their royal blue Sinchon Eagles apparel, while Korea University sport red Anam Tigers kit. So far, Yonsei is leading with 20 wins to Korea U’s 18.

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