The Ground-breaking ceremony for the new Bio Hall was held on the Ilsan Bio-medicare campus at 2 P.M. on March 28th. About 100 people attended this event including Dougguk University President Kim Hee-ok, the head of the Board of Trustees (BOT) Jeongryeon monk, the president of General Alumni Union Song Seok-Hwan, Goyang’s mayor Choi Sung, and KCC E&C CEO Chung Mong-nyul. The Bio Hall is scheduled to be completed by January 2015, with 7 floors above ground and 2 under ground floors, and a total floor area of 29,230㎡. KCC E&C is responsible for the construction. Upon the completion of Bio Hall it will be used by a faculty of more than 40 professors, and more than 800 in the Department of Medical Biotechnology, the Department of Biological and Environmental Science, the Department of Food Science and Biotechnology, and the Department of Life Science, departments in College of Life Science and Biotechnology.

During the speech President Kim Hee-ok said, "We will dedicate this building to showing great achievement thanks to your support. Bio Hall, when it is completed by January 2015, will be a powerful and new growth engine." He added, "If Bio Hall is completed, it would contribute to the development of the country as Northeast Asia biomedical hub, as well as to the development of university and the northern region of Gyeonggi-do."

Kim's speech was followed by Jeongryeon monk’s. Jeongryeon Monk said, "Today is a significant day when another part of Dongguk University history begins. If Bio Hall is completed, Dongguk with a history of 107 years will be ready to make a huge leap forward," adding, "Dongguk will become a university that is a center of technology and research, rather than a general university."

Goyang’s mayor Choi Sung said, "I am sorry we couldn’t offer more support to this project. But with the starting of the construction on the Bio Hall, I will do my best in order to make Goyang 'an educational and medical city', 'the happiest city'." He also said, "In my mind, I am like a Dongguk alumnus, and Dongguk is like municipal university of Goyang, I am committed to the success of this project."

The main participants attended Sisap event that celebrated the beginning of construction, hoping that Bio Hall will be completed successfully.

The Bio-Medicare campus was opened in March 2011. The College of Medicine, the College of Oriental Medicine, the College of Life Science and Biotechnology, and the College of Pharmacy are located around Dongguk's Ilsan hospital on the Bio-medicare campus. Currently, about 1000 students are studying here.

Kim Min-ji  kmj7315@dongguk.edu

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