How COVID-19 affected GKS Scholars of 2020

Hello everyone and welcome to my blog!

If you already have seen my previous posts, you already know that I was a recipient of the Global Korea Scholarship (GKS) 2020. To tell you, I am not yet in South Korea. I was supposed to be at my University last August 5, 2020. We have been affected and the student visa processing was temporarily banned. Countries banned were the Philippines, Indonesia, Russia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, and Kyrgyzstan.

Now, other countries such as Pakistan, Russia, and Indonesia are able to process student visas but we, here in the Philippines, are still temporarily banned.

I just don't understand the basis of this restriction. I know we have this pandemic but why other countries that have the most number of COVID-19 cases were able to process?

In my case, I already took a Leave of Absence for six (6) months in my university. NIIED allows LOA for one (1) year provided you have a valid reason. Other universities offer online classes but once you take online classes, you still cannot have the scholarship stipend because you are simply not in Korea. Stipend runs when you are already in Korea.

This is what happened to us - just hanging, waiting. This is true for Graduate and Undergraduate Scholars of 2020.

COVID-19 really affected us a lot. As a Graduate Scholar, I do not have a job anymore because, upon the release of the Official Results, I and the others also have resigned from their respective jobs in order to prepare for the departure - TB Tests, VISA, and so on.

The situation for other scholars who were already in Korea are also affected. They are taking their classes ONLINE, even though they reside just within the University.

I hope, for those applying this February 2021 (Graduate) and October 2021 (Undergraduate), things will be smooth for you. The vaccine is also already there. Hang in there. Continue to apply no matter what if that is really your dream.

This is what I would like to share, a dream come true just affected by COVID-19, but all of us are fighting! :)

Thank you for reading.