Fulbright U.S. Education Center

A short article in The Korea Times this morning provides another reminder of the high priority this nation places on the college entrance exam.  The headline pretty much tells the story.   A total of 94 domestic flights and two international flights will be re-scheduled this Thursday, when the annual college scholastic ability tests are administered nationwide.  More than half a million high school seniors and repeaters will take the test.

A very informative article appeared in this morning’s Korea Times.  It notes that the number of young students going abroad for study has been dropping since 2006.  According to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, the number of elementary, middle and high school students going abroad to study declined from 29,511 in 2006, to 27,668 in 2007 and 27,349 in 2008.

To provide some historical perspective, in 1998 the number of young students studying abroad was only 1,562.  This number began steadily increasing until it reached a peak in 2006, as shown in the accompanying graphic.

As of 2008, elementary students took up the largest share  with 12, 531 going abroad, compared with 8,888 middle school and 5,930 high school students respectively.

South Korea’s foreign language high schools have become a hot political issue.  A lawmaker from the ruling party has again suggested that they should be eliminated.   The first two foreign language high schools, Daewon and Daeil, were approved in 1992.  Starting in the mid-1990s they gained a reputation of sending most of their students to prestigious universities.  However, they are now being criticized for fueling the private institute or “cram school” market in Korea.

For further background on this issue, read the article in today’s Joongang Ilbo.

As noted in a recent article in the Chosun Ilbo, almost 2,000 students dropped out of Korea’s highly competitive foreign language high schools between 2004 and 2008.  This represented a dropout rate of approximately two percent.  The report suggested that those who dropped out had found themselves on the lower rungs of academic accomplishment, so chose to drop out and take the high school equivalence test instead.

According to an article in the Chosun Ilbo today, eight out of ten salaried workers think they are underpaid because of their poor English skills.  In the survey of almost 1,500 employed workers conducted by a jobs site, 89.9 percent of respondents said that if they had a better command of English they would be better paid.

When asked what they would do if they had a better command of English, most said transfer to a larger firm (54.4 percent), followed by working in another field (20.4 percent), negotiating their salary (13.3 percent) and leaving the company to found their own business (7.8 percent).

According to a report in today’s Korea Times, the number of foreign students studying at colleges and universities in South Korea now totals 50,591.  This figure is 10,000 more than in April of 2008, a twenty percent year-on-year increase.   40,000 of these students came from China, representing 78 percent of the total.  Mongolia ranked next with 1,632 students, followed by Viet Nam and Japan with 2.9 percent and 2.2 percent respectively.

The number of foreign professors has also increased in recent years.  There are currently 4,127 international educators teaching at Korean colleges, up from 3,433 last year, 2,919 in 2007 and 2,540 in 2006.

As reported in the Korea Times, it’s easy to spot the neatly dressed kindergarteners hopping out of BMWs and Maseratis in front of the southern Seoul campus of British International Pre School (BIPS), a prestigious English-speaking kindergarten rumored to be most sought-after by the rich moms in town.

The school’s annual tuition hovers above 18 million won ($14,400) ― more than four times the tuition for public universities ― but money doesn’t seem to be the problem. It’s the competition rate.  One mother who failed to get her six-year-old son into the program says she felt defeated when she had to enroll her child in a regular neighborhood kindergarten, which typically charges 200,000 won to 400,000 won per month.

BIPS, Bambini and some 20 other English-speaking “premium” kindergartens claim to provide only the best and charge anywhere from 1.5 million to 2 million won per month.

As reported in The Korea Times, a total of 457 elementary and secondary schools across the nation have been selected as schools that will attempt to free their students from private tutoring. To do this through upgrading curricula and other programs, the schools will receive subsidies from the government.  According to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, about 1,000 schools had applied for the subsidy program.

The selected schools will receive an average of 130 million won ($102,000) per year ― the government plans to spend about 60 billion won on the project this year.

The “private tutoring-free schools” are expected to run tailor-made programs or after-school classes with the special budget as well as hire more teachers.

The schools are obliged to regularly survey private cram school costs of their students and report it to the ministry. Those who fail to reduce private education costs will no longer be entitled to the subsidies.

As reported by the Joongang Daily today, the government of President Lee Myung Bak, through the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology and the ruling Grand National Party, are set to release a “Road Map to Ease Private Education Costs” by the end of July.   This is the latest salvo in a perennial political battle to curb the influence of private institutes or “hagwons” in Korean education.  Reportedly the proposal will ban cram schools for elementary school children after 9:00 P.M. and for middle and high school students after 10:00 P.M.

At a meeting with ministers on June 23rd, President Lee reportedly said that “Getting rid of private education is crucial for reducing the financial burden on lower income households, but it seems hagwons have a strong lobbying capacity.”  Although Korea is expected to post negative economic growth this year, spending on private education, including hagwons and tutoring, rose to 20.9 trillion won ($16.4 billion) from 20.4 trillion won a year earlier.

CNN and other media covered the inauguration last week of a new English Education City on the island province of Jeju.  The central idea of the project is to create a city where elementary, middle and high schools—and eventually universities–teach all of their courses in English.  Top-notch schools from outside Korea are being invited to participate in the project.  One of the first is Britain’s North London Collegiate School.

The English Education City aims to reduce the need for Korean families to send their children oveseas for an English-language education.  Jeju officials say annual tuition will be somewhere between U.S. $3,100 and U.S. $4,700 or about half the amount South Korean parents would be paying to send their children overseas.

The English language market in Korea has already resulted in 21 “English Villages” around the country. Next month, an English village capable of schooling some 5,000 children will open in the southern city of Keoje.  Although more such projects are popping up, the Jeju Global Education City is by far the most ambitious.