The suicides of four students since the start of the year at the prestigious Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) in Daejeon are putting pressure on its president, Nam Pyo Suh.

An assistant director at the US National Science Foundation in 1984–88 and head of mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1991 to 2001, Suh came to the state-financed KAIST in South Korea in 2006 to improve competition. His predecessor was the Nobel laureate Robert Laughlin, who spent a two-year term trying to reshape KAIST in the mould of successful US institutions. Suh got “much farther” in accomplishing what Laughlin started, the Wall Street Journal thinks.

But after the most recent suicide, on 7 April, Korean media is buzzing with reports that faculty and students are criticizing his educational reforms and leadership (Korea Times). The Korea Joongang Daily and AFP say Suh has already agreed to scrap a controversial policy which links student fees to academic performance.