With the coming of age of knowledge based society, the trends toward
internationalization and commercialization in higher education sector require national
universities to respond to the changes by planning the specialization. The purpose of
this study is to provide national universities in Korea with standards as well as
strategies for the specialization through analyzing and synthesizing their environment,
status quo, and philosophy. The authors built up a questionnaire to locate universities
based on the Rowley and Sherman's tools for strategic change in higher education, core
indicators represented on the Academy Info System and recommendations from the
professional committee. After conducting a survey and investigating national universities'
visions and strategies, the authors categorized them into four types: research oriented
university, education & research university, education oriented university, and
professional graduate school. Finally, they provided suggestions on specialization
strategies for each category. In addition, they included following recommendations: first,
university autonomy and spontaneity are essential prerequisites for specialization;
second, the recommendations suggested in the study is only available when a university
has fully prepared the prerequisites. Therefore, one must be very cautious when
applying those suggestions and recommendations in the study, and give careful
considerations on differences of individual institutions; third, upon establishment of the
strategic plan for specialization, a university must perform it with detailed and elaborated action plan; fourth, a university must choose a goal and strategies for
sustainable development responding to the changes of environment and it not only
locate itself in an appropriate specialization but also concentrate resources on the
specialization areas to cultivate capacity for human resource development.