2019 Korean History and Cultural Seminar for Educators - Handbook 2019 NKS Handbook-0617 | Page 15

Ms. Mary Connor
Co-founder & Advisor, National Korean Studies Seminar
Ms. Mary Connor taught United States history and Asian Studies for 35 years in the Los Angeles area.
She was the co-founder of the Korea Academy for Educators and served as President and Program
Director from 2004 to 2012. She now serves as Advisor for the National Korean Studies Seminar. Since
2004, she has organized approximately 100 days of workshops on Korea from coast to coast. Mary has
also published two library reference books (The Koreas: A Global Studies Handbook and Asia in Focus:
The Koreas). She is the author of Common Core: Korea, Lessons and Resources for the K-12 Classroom
(2015).
As a result of her efforts, she received the Republic of Korea’s Prime Minister’s Award in 2011. In the
same year, she received the Daekyo Global Education Award that included a free trip to Korea for Mary
and her husband. She has also been honored by the Korean Consulate General Los Angeles and has
accepted awards from the Council of Korean Studies at Michigan State University, the Peace Corps
Association, and the Organization of American Historians. She was also awarded the Pestalozzi Award
from Korean American Educational Research Center in 2014.
Ms. Sung Kim
Director & Co-founder, National Korean Studies Seminar
Ms. Sung Kim is the Director and Co-founder of the National Korean Studies Seminar. Graduate of
Seoul National University, she has taught in the Korean dual language program in LAUSD and
HLPUSD for 23 years. She is also the President of International Korean Educators Network (IKEN) and
a board member and former president of K-12 Korean Language Teachers Association. She played a
major role in developing the K-12 online Korean Curriculum and online Korean Course. She was
awarded as 2011 Distinguished Teacher of the Year from the Ministry of Education in South Korea and
was awarded the Global Korea Award from Michigan University in 2017.
Ms. Jini Shim
Assistant Director, National Korean Studies Seminar
Since 2016, Jini Shim served as the assistant director of NKS. She obtained her multiple subject
teaching credential with Korean bilingual authorization from CSUF last May and plans on obtaining a
single subject teaching credential in Korean this fall. She currently teaches Korean at Korean American
Center in Irvine, which will host its second annual STARTALK program funded by the National
Security Agency this July. She received her MA in Applied Linguistics at SDSU and her BA in
Communication at UCSD.

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