Yonsei Korea

Problems and Solutions

The Problems of Korean Education by Oh, Su-ji

The main problem of Korean education is that it focuses on entering Universities making students weak, calculating and uncreative. Koreans are likely to classify qualities of universities. They prefer only few universities of high qualities like Seoul univ, Yonsei univ and Korea univ. (These universities are similar to the IVY in U.S.) Because of this trend, many high school students often become desperate when they go to other universities of low qualities or they cannot go universities. From time to time, some students commit suicide because of this reason. Schools in Korea always teach same things to students with diverse interests and talents to ensure they enter universities. The teachers teach their students only simple mechanical knowledge which is reinforced by rote memories that are needed for the entrance exam. When I was a high school student, I didn't learn any subjects that are unnecessary for the entrance exam like Chinese characters, music and art n my senior year at school. Students always study in order to go to universities from morning to night in a small classroom. Many of them go to Academies or have tutoring lessons after school. This education which overemphasizes universities kills creativity, potential talents and interests of students. The students are forced only to study not to do other activities. Most students end up ignoring what they want and what they can do well. In reality, Korean parents and teachers tend to hate their children or students when they want to be singers even if they sing very well. To focus on entering universities make students uncritical, uncreative and drifting in the middle of nowhere.

A Shameful Story by An Dong Kwan

My girl friend's brother still doesn't know why his teacher stopped hitting his head. When he became a junior in high school, he went to an honor class. My girl friend's brother was a new one in that class because he had studied very hard in the year before. One month later, his class teacher has often hit his head without any reason, and it has made him very unpleasant and angry. Eventually, he told his family about his teacher's hitting. Worrying about it, his mother heard other parents had already visited the class teacher. Therefore, she decided to meet the teacher. She kept it secret to my girl friend's brother, because my friend's brother had never thought about giving any bribes to his teacher and no doubt he would hate it. Anyway, his mother met the teacher and gave a gift to him. (She and teacher only know what it is.) After several days, he told his family that his teacher didn't hit him anymore. He seemed to be happy, so his family didn't say anything about the bribe. It is a shameful happening that some teachers still want bribes and accept them. This attitude of teachers let parents give bribes to teacher of their children's class. It resulted in lack of conscience and sympathy between teacher and student. They should come into close relation with each other. This close relation between them is a solution to this situation and it uproots shameful happenings like this story.

Korean High School Equalization System by Park Ji-young

Korean high school had different grades, so middle school students had to compete at early age to enter high-ranked high schools. Korean government abolished this system, and adopted high school equalization system to respect students' diverse aptitudes and capabilities. However high school equalization system settled improperly in Korea. The primary reason of this situation is that Korean government didn't legislate the specific policies. In high school equalization system, there are many students with various aptitudes and capabilities in one school, so different leveled teaching is needed to different graded students. However, Korean government offered same instruction to all students; these incomplete policies caused excellent students to lose interest and inferior students to give up following the progress. Korean coarse education circumstance is also important reason. For example, one teacher charges too many students in Korea. Teachers only can give mere attention to each student, so recognizing each student's aptitudes and capabilities is difficult for teachers. This caused Korean students to lose the opportunities to display their own gift. Immature thought on diversity is also the reason. Korean people still adhere to the thought that getting high score is the best and often ignore each student's individualities. This stereotype blocked the proper settling of high school equalization system. Korean government executed high school equalization system to respect students' diverse aptitudes and different capabilities. However, the incomplete policies, coarse education circumstance, and immature thought prevented this system from settling properly.

The Present Scapegoat, “Wang-tta” by Kim, Ji-young

Many Korean students are suffering from the fear of being “Wang-tta. ” ( a kind of slang that indicate the student who is terribly ostracized and the culture which arises from ostracism) Terrible news has been reported in recent years that some Korean students committed suicide because they couldn't bear the pains of “Wang-tta.” The

press of Korea also warned that the phenomenon is not trivial quarrel of children but one of the serious social problems. Now, Koreans including students, parents and teachers consider “Wang-tta” as negative social phenomenon to make Korea educational circumstance agreeable. There are some reasons why “Wang-tta”, the odd culture, occurred in Korea. The students who are “Wang-tta” have personality in common such as cowardice, timidity. However, there are social and cultural causes that are more fundamental. Korean society is very competitive to succeed, so they should struggle to occupy the superior position to others. Moreover, Koreans have strong group consciousness , so they are likely to overlook thoughts of individuals and ignore person whom they don't like without reasons. Those things explain well why Koreans want to make scapegoat like “Wang-tta.” Therefore, Koreans should try to solve the problems of “Wang-tta”, perceiving these facts. Korean schools should help “Wang-tta,” the student who is ostracized, develop sound identity. Korean education department should

offer various curriculums that is helpful to improve cohesiveness between classmates through group activity, discussion. In addition, all Koreans should endeavor to establish a culture in which people respect the individuality. If Koreans pay attention to solve problems of “Wang-tta” by methods based on my recommendations, Korean students will be able to enjoy their school life before long.

Why Does a New University Admission System of Korea Fail? by Song, Ji Yeon

Recently the Korea Ministry of Education introduced a new university admission system, but the new system ended in failure after all. Most universities still want a grind under the new university admission system. For a long time, in Korea, students who are good at studies only could get into a college. The Korea Ministry of Education created a new university admission system to settle this problem. It values not only student's school marks but their various talents, such as an essay writing skill and an inventive ability. Nevertheless, most universities prefer students with high school marks and they keep on selecting such students constantly. The educational system and teachers of high school were not prepared for the new university admission system in advance. Students mostly depend on the private academy to prepare a university entrance examination in these days. Ironically, some private academies are more helpful rather than the high school to students for college indeed. The majority of students and their parents just desire to go to prestigious college and famous department as ever. A great part of students do not consider their aptitude, interest and ability at all, though a new system emphasizes student's own special capability. No matter how creditable the system is, it fails unless people get over their prejudice. The new university admission system goes wrong because of insufficient preparation. Even now the Korean Ministry of Education must aid high school to follow the new university admission system and a university should open the gate to the talented in Korea.

Frequent Reforms of Korean Education System by Kim Yong Shin

The policy planner of education must set up the consistent philosophy to avoid internal disorder that caused from frequent reforms of education market. The Korean government does not have consistent policy to the education system. The Korean government's policy served to do little more than to patch over each problem temporarily when it arose. For example, students could take test twice a year when the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) replaced the old university entrance system in 1993; however, the ministry of education changed the number of time that students can take test from twice to one time in 1994. The policy planner of education changed it in order to cut down on expenses from making test questions and rating. Interest groups related to the Korean education push their agendas on the education market. The Korean teacher's union and the Korean guild of institutes have carried their different agendas strongly. Although the Korean teacher's union has insisted to boycott of private institutes for normalization of public education, the Korean guild of institutes, on the contrary, has asserted roles of private institutes in Korea. Excessive demand in the education market from students and their parents urged a policy maker to reform Korean education system. The demand-pull in the education market triggers cutthroat competition, especially on university entrance examination. This cutthroat competition causes a lot of harmful side effects, especially to the students. It has forced the policy maker to reform system easier to the students than the old one. The Korean education system has experienced a lot of reforms; however, system reform without consistent philosophy did not achieve their aim.

"Blood-Splashing" Competition by Kim Min Sang

Before entering the university, Korean students are said to be in a "blood-splashing" competition; Jason of the "Friday the 13th" and vampires have nothing to do with it, mind you; it is just describing the cold-hearted, ruthless, and, often, sleepless competition that haunts the young students in Korea. Competition is good for brewing excellence and for selecting the fittest. If it becomes "blood-splashing", however, the meaning and the purpose of competing get lost, covered with bloody results, showing only the stained outcome of the competition. Health and morality fall victims to a winners-take-all situation like the university selection in Korea. When you can win so much for so long, cheating becomes a necessity so long as getting caught is out the equation, and sleeping less becomes a habit as long as the body holds out. All Koreans know this pathetic fact, including the Department of Education. What can the authorities do to stop this overheated race? Trying to force students to sleep more for their own health would create thunderous laughs in the world of reality. Only thing that can be done is to try to ensure fair play. Ensuring fair play, however, can be a pain in the neck. In Korea, homework and projects -in fact, everything that needs to be handed in- are not counted as much as the exams. Some say that it is so because there are too many students per teacher: There are fifty students in a class on average. The truth of the matter, however, is that exams are heavily relied upon because other tools for judging academic aptitude are simply not trustworthy. Homework and projects can be done by other people; there is actually an internet site providing proxy for homework and projects, and catching illegal acts as these have smaller chance of taking place than finding a needle in the haystack. Besides, even the teachers cannot be fully trusted. Koreans teachers and students have ties that go beyond morality. Furthermore, teachers are highly regarded if their students get accepted to prestigious universities, so they have a tendency to be generous in giving grades. Exams are not the fairest way of them all, though. Too much emphasis put on the fair play, and thus making the exam the only measure of academic ability has created severe side effects. Almost all Korean students have now become the master in the art of exam taking, but they trail far behind the foreign students in all the other areas of processing and expressing knowledge. Only after setting foot in the universities do Korean students begin to learn to do joint projects and to have their own idea freed from the mental bars of multiple choice questions. The modern society needs people who are skilled in recycling knowledge and in communicating, more than people who are just good at exam taking. Exams exist to check what people know and how well they know. In everyday life, especially in the office, it shows through the work produced by the person. Outside schools and universities, exams are rarely ever needed. Thus black cloud hangs gloomingly over the crevice of discrepancy between the supply of exam experts and the demand of the society. The only ray of hope is the eagerness, the hunger of the Korean people to succeed. The hope that this desire soaring high will somehow overcome the ironic impediment and help the Koreans reach the higher plain of success.

The Problems with Bribes by Kim, Sung hee

Many Korean accept or offer a bribe customarily in spite of its injustice, and it sometimes occurs between parents and teachers. Such a bribe hurts not only parents and teachers but also children. First, offering a bribe burdens parents economically. Average cost of a bribe per parents was about one hundred and forty thousand, according to research of "Korean Institute of Criminology" in 1998. It's not low to ordinary people. Offering a bribe also burdens them mentally. Parents worry about their children when they don't give a bribe to teachers. They think teachers may treat their children with indifference because of not offering a bribe. Second, accepting a bribe affects teachers negatively. Teachers who accepted a bribe are afraid of a punishment for their illegal behavior and a blame for their immoral behavior. They also feel shameful whenever they look at their students. They have a guilty conscience, and it really hurts them. However, it is most negative that a bribe makes children have a wrong thought. Children observe their teacher and parents carefully as teacher and parents do them. Some parents or teachers may think that children don't know about their wrong behavior, but they know all of them. A bribe between parents and teachers causes children to have a wrong thought that money makes everything possible. Each of these children becomes a selfish person, and he or she tends to solve all problems with money. Therefore parents and teachers must remove a bribe between them for their own sake and for their children.

Comparative Grading System in Universities of Korea by Lee Seung-hyung

Comparative grading system, which is adopted as the main grading policy by most universities in Korea, has both advantages and disadvantages to students. The comparative grading system can lead students to make more efforts on their majors and other academic subjects related to the colleges. Before the adoption of the grading system, most Korean students often wasted their freshman years on drinking much alcohol, meeting boy or girl friends, or concerning too much in political issues which have no direct connection with their majors. Nowadays, in order to get a good grade, students cannot help spending more time in their examinations and assignments than their seniors under the traditional grading system - not comparative - did. The comparative grading system, however, overheats students' competitive spirit among their classmates. Under this system, a student has to win over his or her colleagues if he or she wants to make a good score. Students are, therefore, often easy to be selfish and hard to cultivate a friendly feeling with their schoolmates. The comparative grading system can also breed lack of creativities on majors or academic thinking. Students are interested only in their grade of each class although they are expected to learn how to think originally on their studies and harden their academic basis with thought of their own. This system will train students to be test-taking specialists, not creative thinkers; furthermore, students will not be able to obtain excellent results in a view of either academic or social achievement. To summarize, the comparative grading system in universities of Korea makes students devote themselves to their studies; however, it also causes excessive competition for grade among classmates and lack of originality in the fields of their majors.

Why The Korean Government Prohibited Corporal Punishment by Miae Kang

It has been very controversial in Korean if physical punishment is allowable is or not. Nevertheless, the Korean government passed a law that makes beating stopped at school. There are several reasons why the Korean government prohibited teachers from beating their students as a way of punishment. There is not any definite standard to adopt beating as a punishment. It is difficult to determine how, how much, when to beat and which rod to use. They depend on each teacher. Therefore, students hardly acknowledge the reason why they are beaten. Since the respect to teachers diminished, more and more students would not accept teachers' punishment. In the ancient time, teachers were respected so much under Confusion influence so nobody complained about punishment whatever it was. However, as Confusion influence got weak, teachers got to have little authority over their students. Currently, teachers are often sued for infliction corporal punishment on their students. There are also serious problems because some teachers abuse punishment as a form of beating. Some teachers make a certain student a sacrifice by beating him or her too much as an example. Teachers want to prove they are very strict and to make other students disciplined. It is not right way of using physical punishment. Finally, the Korean government decided to inhibit corporal punishment for several reasons written above.

Korean Students and Club Activities

I've always thought club activities as interesting, fun. I personally felt that it could even help us learn things that are important such as philosophy, writing skills, and the ability to debate. That is the reason I decided to make a club of my own. When I was in ninth grade, I had four very good friends. We all loved reading books and writing fictions of our own, so we made a literature club. We got together once a week, and held a club meeting to decide on the topics to write about. Sometimes, we would read interesting novels such as "Tuesdays with Morrie," "Sophie's World," "The Color Purple." After reading them, we shared our feelings and reactions with each other. The club was a wonderful way of enjoying our hobbies, so my friends and I were quite pleased. Unfortunately, the teachers and our parents did not like the idea of us spending our time on something other than school studies. They thought the club activities were nothing but a bad distraction. Teachers punished us, and told us to break up the club. The real problem was that we could not protest to the adults, because some of the members got bad grades on an important exam. We knew that the reason to the grade fall was the extra time we put on reading and writing instead of studying for the exam. However, none of the club members thought we were doing something foolish. We just wanted to have fun and ----enjoy literature. After that, all we could do was keep on writing discreetly, and also study hard for the next upcoming exam. I learned from my experience that the Korean education system is focused on the university entrance examination. Students are forced to concentrate on school studies only. This kind education system should be fixed. Teachers should keep in mind that activities outside school can develop independency, individuality. Therefore, club activities should be encouraged, not banned.

Too Many Students in One Class by Yi, Kyung Seon

In the Korean high school, more than 30 students are studying in one class, and this results in the poor condition of an education. First, teachers do not know what each student is interested in. Teachers complain about not being able to control a number of students. It prevents them from understanding students' interests which can be important information to guide students. Second, there are too many students to have class discussion which improves student's ability of expressing their ideas logically. If teachers try to have every student participates in discussion, they startled to see how little time each student can have. Usually, teachers give up debate, and choose one way lecturing. Thus, Korean students are lack of ability to express their thoughts clearly. Third, students become passive in a class. Having no chance to talk about their opinions, students always listen to what teachers say. They do not feel the need to think about what they are learning. They get easily bored, and wish the time pass away quickly. As the number of students in a class grows, the quality of an education lower, therefore, to reduce the number of students in a class is an important problem that the Korean education should solve

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