On December 18, Yonsei University officially appointed former Korean Ambassador to the United States, Lee Tae-sik, as its first Laney Professor.  As Laney Professor, Ambassador Lee will be teaching at Underwood International College (UIC) in 2014.  Ambassador Lee was named Laney Professor for his many achievements and contributions to Korea’s international relations as a career diplomat.
 The Laney Professorship was established in 2012 to commemorate the distinguished career of Dr. James T. Laney who served as U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Korea from 1993 to 1996.  In the early 1960s, Dr. Laney served as a Methodist missionary teaching at Yonsei University, and he went on to receive a PhD from Yale University.  After a stint as a professor at Vanderbilt Divinity School, Dr. Laney moved to Emory University, where he served as the university’s president from 1977 to 1993.  Throughout his long life, Dr. Laney has made innumerable contributions to the advancement of U.S.-Korea relations, while forcefully promoting academic research in the field of international relations.