There is ‘Gwanjeong Ijonghwan-daero’ in Uiryeong-gun, Gyeongsangnam-do. It is a 4km section from Mujeon-ri, Uiryeong-eup to Jeongdong-ri, Yongdeok-myeon. Gwanjeong Lee Jong-hwan, who is commemorated with an honorary road name in Uiryeong-gun, is the former chairman of Samyounghak Group, known as the ‘ King of Donations of 1.7 Trillion Won.’ Uiryeong-gun’s pride in him is so great that on November 20, 2022, a celebration event for his 100th birthday will be held at his birthplace in Yongdeok-myeon, Uiryeong-gun.
Former Chairman Lee Jong-hwan was born in Uiryeong, Gyeongsangnam-do in 1924. His actual year of birth is said to be 1923. After graduating from Masan High School, he completed two years of economics and economics at Meiji University in Japan in 1944.
He founded Samyoung Industrial Co., Ltd. in 1958 and developed it into Samyoung Group, which currently has 16 companies, including Samyoung Heavy Industries. In particular, we are ranked first in Korea in the production of product packaging materials, and have grown into one of the world’s top three manufacturers of capacitor films, a core material for all electronic products.
In 2000, he used 1 trillion won of his own money to establish the Gwanjeong Lee Jong-Hwan Education Foundation. It is Asia’s largest scholarship foundation, ranked 90th in the world’s top 100 charitable foundations.
His dream when establishing an educational foundation was for Korea to become a Nobel Prize-winning country in science and engineering. Since the establishment of the foundation메이저사이트, scholarships worth 15 billion won have been provided to 1,000 domestic and foreign students each year. To date, the number of scholarship students who have received scholarships from the Kwanjeong Foundation has reached 12,000, and the number of doctoral degree recipients has reached 750. The amount of scholarships paid out so far amounts to 270 billion won. In 2012, he donated 60 billion won to build Kwanjeong-gwan (Central Library) at Seoul National University. The amount of property he has donated to the foundation so far amounts to 1.7 trillion won.
What kind of talent did he want to foster by establishing the foundation? Kwanjeong’s ideal talent is called the ‘3C’. 《① Challenge : Students with clear and specific academic goals ② Creativity : Students with excellent learning ability, creativity, and passion ③ Contribution : Physically healthy students who wish to dedicate themselves to the nation and human society》.
After his own success, he wanted to develop talented people who would devote themselves to the country and society. Lee Jong-hwan, former chairman of Samyoung Group, who lived his entire life with this mindset, passed away from old age at Seoul National University Hospital at 1:48 a.m. on September 13, 2023. He is 100 years old.
Kwanjeong Chairman Lee Jong-hwan’s last words on his deathbed were, “Live as you should. Justice wins in the end. Know how to forgive one another. It is very unfortunate that I will not be able to see a Nobel Prize winner among our Kwanjeong scholarship recipients.”