The reasons why Korea adopted 5-year architectural education accreditation were; to improve the quality of architectural education in line with the global standard, to satisfy the licensure qualification for architects recommended by UIA which required five-year university program followed by two-year internship period, and thirdly to foster globally cross-accredited architects in this free-market global economy. These objectives of the architectural education accreditation were obviously in good faith at the start, however if we are to appraise the practical benefits up to date, it is high time now to deliberately calculate for whom it has brought benefits. (Here the term ‘whom’ includes any organization, group, state, society or cross-national entity.)
In this article, the author selected four prominent universities’ undergraduate architectural education programs in Seoul metropolitan area and made analysis about the status of application for admission and the trends of the graduate employment rates. All of the subject schools are architecture accredited schools and changes from year 2006 to 2013 were analysed by each year. Even though the competition rate of the entrance examination cannot be a sole indicator of the application for admission, the author can indirectly verify that implementation of the 5-year accreditation program did not make influence on the rate of application for admission either positively or negatively.
There has been no significant changes in the career paths of the graduates. During period from 2008 to 2013 only below 30 % of architecture graduates were employed by architecture design companies, and the number was declining steadily. In a word, even though the architectural accreditation began with sufficient objectives and ideals at start, it has became an impaired system which could not satisfy the needs of the society and the period. In our reality of cramming method of education the universities shackled themselves by adopting the accreditation system which did not allow rooms for creativity and experiments. Even though one may say that the introduction of 5-year architecture education accreditation was necessary, but it should have progressed in more rational process of deliberate contemplation about our situation and after the government’s policy had been established.
Still there remains some possibilities. As the initially-accredited programs were receiving re-accreditation, the criteria of accreditation have changed to be more practical and our attitude of accepting the system has also changed.
In order to achieve the qualitative growth of architecture education in line with the global standards, we need to have more flexibility toward assessment of student evaluation criteria and have an attitude that encourages creativity and originality in education programs.