'Star Veterinarian' Director Yoon Shin-geun (Director, Dr. Yoon Shin-geun Animal Hospital, Class of 1972, College of Veterinary Medicine) has donated a total of KRW 1.1 billion to his alma mater, Jeonbuk National University (JBNU).

Yoon began donating to his alma mater and its students in 2000. He has sent a set amount to JBNU each year. At JBNU's KRW 7.7 billion development fund campaign launch ceremony held on the morning of the 5th at 11 a.m., he donated KRW 40 million, bringing his cumulative donations to date to KRW 1.0 billion. At the ceremony, he additionally donated KRW 100 million on-site.

Believing even these annual donations were insufficient, Yoon pledged KRW 500 million in 2011 and completed payment in 2021. Upon completing that pledge, he pledged another KRW 500 million that year, and has continued making annual donations.

At that time, wishing to support veterinary students' practical training, he also donated equipment for animal tissue biopsy and autologous stem cell transfusion valued at approximately KRW 100 million. The total amount he has donated and pledged for his alma mater and its students now reaches KRW 1.7 billion.

Yoon's heartfelt commitment to donating to his alma mater stems from his own experience attending university under difficult circumstances. While enrolled in the Department of Veterinary Medicine at JBNU (Class of 1972), he worked as a door-to-door salesperson and held other jobs because of his family's financial hardship. Thanks to the valuable scholarship he received from JBNU at that time, he was able to complete his studies diligently. As a result, he naturally developed a desire to give back to younger students at his alma mater who face similar circumstances.

Yoon Shin-geun said, "Although I experienced hardship during my school years, I am who I am today because of the help I received from my alma mater. With a sense of duty to return what I received, I have not forgotten the development fund despite setbacks such as the COVID-19 pandemic," adding, "If this fund can serve as a foundation for my alma mater to continue its transformation and innovation into a Glocal University, and if younger students can pursue their studies without the kind of difficulties I faced during my university years, there would be no greater joy."

Meanwhile, Yoon has operated an animal hospital in Seoul since 1985, and has served as an invited and adjunct professor at Seoul National University, contributing to the establishment of what was then the unfamiliar companion animal culture in South Korea.

Each year he funds a companion animal photography competition from his own resources and has published books such as "World Canine Encyclopedia," "Raising Dogs," "Jindo Dog," "Pungsan Dog," "Osu Dog," and "A Veterinarian Who Fears Dogs," contributing to the spread of companion animal culture. He has also undertaken a project to restore the "Osu Dog," a breed that disappeared from the region a thousand years ago. In particular, he founded the Korea Animal Protection Research Association in 1991, at a time when the concept of animal protection barely existed, and led efforts to establish animal rights, including campaigning against the consumption of bosintang (dog meat soup).