Korea Polytechnics President Lee Cheol-su presides over a summer facility safety inspection at the North Jeolla Province campus on Thursday. [Korea Polytechnics]
Korea Polytechnics President Lee Cheol-su presides over a summer facility safety inspection at the North Jeolla Province campus on Thursday. [Korea Polytechnics]

Korea Polytechnics has obtained ISO 45001 international occupational health and safety management certification for its school foundation and Incheon campus, accelerating its push to establish an international safety management framework across all campuses.

The university announced Wednesday that the school foundation and Incheon campus had received ISO 45001 certification. The move follows the same certification obtained by the Seoul Jeongsu and Chuncheon campuses in December last year. Korea Polytechnics plans to complete the rollout of an international occupational health and safety management system across all eight of its regional campuses by 2027.

ISO 45001 is the international occupational health and safety standard issued by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). Korea Polytechnics had previously become the first university in South Korea to receive domestic occupational health and safety management certification — known as KOSHA-MS — for its school foundation and Incheon campus in 2023, and has now upgraded to the internationally recognized ISO 45001 framework.

The certification process involved standardizing safety and health regulations and operational procedures and establishing a workplace risk assessment regime. The university also extended safety management coverage to include workers from partner contractors and introduced a plan-do-check-act (PDCA) cycle to continuously identify and address hazards, raising the overall standard of safety management.

Korea Polytechnics plans to pursue ISO 45001 certification for its Changwon campus in September and will continue expanding the certification on a rolling basis, with the goal of completing the international occupational health and safety management framework across all eight regional campuses by 2027.

"In a vocational education institution where hands-on, field-based training takes place, safety is a fundamental condition directly tied to the quality of education," Korea Polytechnics President Lee Cheol-su said. "We will extend the international occupational health and safety management system to every campus to create an environment where students, faculty and staff, and partner contractor workers can all learn and work with confidence."


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