VANK announced on July 21, 2026, that it has published a new educational storybook and webtoon, The Secret of the Global Mega Cruise: Building Lifeboats Together, aimed at helping young people develop global citizenship in the age of artificial intelligence.
The educational content, available through the World Changer platform at World Changer, combines storytelling and webtoon illustrations to encourage Korean teenagers and young adults to become active participants in addressing global challenges rather than passive observers.
According to VANK, the project moves beyond traditional textbook- and lecture-based approaches to global citizenship education by using a narrative format that is more familiar and engaging for younger generations. The organization said the initiative also represents an effort to combine the worldwide popularity of Korean webtoons with global citizenship education, creating a model that could eventually be adapted as a cultural Official Development Assistance (ODA) resource for developing countries and overseas Korean communities.
The story is built around a fictional setting in which the world’s estimated population of 8.3 billion people in 2026 is represented by 10,000 passengers aboard a luxury cruise ship. In this imagined world, each passenger symbolizes approximately 830,000 people, providing a framework for explaining complex global issues in a simple and accessible way.
Through the lives of the passengers, the story explores some of the world’s most pressing challenges, including poverty, climate change, digital inequality, water shortages, refugee crises and widening development gaps.
At the center of the story are a young Korean named “VANK” and Aisha, a girl representing the Global South. After leaving the ship’s luxurious upper decks and meeting Aisha in the lower decks, which symbolize developing countries, the protagonist comes face to face with the realities of extreme poverty, climate change and digital exclusion before joining efforts to address those challenges.
VANK said the work also highlights new forms of digital imperialism emerging in the AI era and the marginalization of the Global South’s history and culture in digital information ecosystems. The organization said the content is intended to encourage young readers to recognize global issues as their own responsibility and to view themselves as agents of change.
The publication also introduces several civic participation models proposed by VANK, including the concept of a “one-person AI international organization” operated through a smartphone, global campaigns carried out in cooperation with more than 200 million Korean Wave fans worldwide, and the creation of digital maps designed to strengthen historical and cultural sovereignty in the AI era.
The story further emphasizes the importance of protecting historical and cultural information in artificial intelligence services, citing examples such as the representation of places and history in the Global South, as well as issues surrounding the labeling of Dokdo and the East Sea in global digital platforms.
Park Gi-tae, head of VANK, said he hopes the publication will inspire young people to play a leading role in solving global challenges.
“Drawing on Korea’s experience of overcoming colonial rule and the devastation of war, we hope teenagers and young adults will become leaders in addressing global issues through the literary world of webtoons and storybooks,” Park said. “We also hope Korea’s own journey of growth can serve as a source of hope for people around the world.”
He added that VANK plans to continue producing educational content tailored to the AI era to help young people engage more naturally with global citizenship education.
The organization said it plans to use the new storybook and webtoon in global citizenship education programs at elementary, middle and high schools, as well as in lectures promoting Korea. It also intends to distribute the materials to Korean language schools overseas and to learners studying the Korean language around the world.