Elite Students’ Unrevealed Stress
“Miracle on the Han River” describes South Korea’s rapid transformation from a hopeless postwar country to the world’s 13th largest economy. Not only its economic growth but also its dramatically increased literacy rate from less than 30 percent to 98 percent in one generation surprised the world (Faiola). Experts explained that improvement in education contributed to this “Miracle” bringing up human resources. However, from 2000 to 2003, South Korea saw more than one thousand students commit suicide (Card). Because of an excessive influence of Confucianism and rapid economic growth, South Korean society places extreme expectations and pressures on its students.
With Confucian heritage, South Korea has applied Confucius’ idea on its philosophy of education. In Confucius’ view, hierarchy is the basis of the natural order of the universe: sons follow their father, students respect their teacher, and the people obey their ruler (Elliott). Confucius said, “I transmit, but I do not create” (qtd in Elliott). He emphasized that “the purpose of education was not to innovate but to refine ideas” (Elliott). Following his theory, South Korean education has concentrated on “rote memorization and the ability to pass official exams” (Elliott). Moreover, suffering great poverty after the thirty-five year of Japanese colonial control and the Korean War, the South Korean postwar generation believed that the only way not to inherit its poverty to its next generation was to provide good education. Parents considered only academic study as a springboard for a better life with more income and higher fame because, before Japan colonized Korea, people lived in the Korean-Confucian class system which allowed only those who passed national examinations to secure a government position (Elliott). Therefore, the parents wanted their children to get not technical but scholastic education. As a result, with a long history of Confucian thought, South Korean students have learned that they should enter high-status colleges for better quality of education in order to succeed in their life.
South Korean government has generously provided financial support on education, but it ultimately instigated severe competition among students. Since South Korea was poor in natural resources, especially after the Korean War, its government focused on developing human capital for economic growth. The South Korea’s first rulers, Syngman Rhee and General Park Chung-hee, expanded primary, secondary, and vocational education (Foster-Carter, “Classroom Wars … Part 1”). As a result, by 1990, enrollment at each level of schooling increased rapidly, reaching 90 percent (Lee). The government’s generous support of education has produced skillful and hardworking human power who contributed to economic growth in the period of one generation. However, the government’s over-control gives little autonomy to schools including colleges, which causes uniformity of each student’s learning. The Ministry of Education is responsible for textbook guidelines, curriculum, admission policy, and other policy decisions (Foster-Carter, “Classroom Wars … Part 2”). This puts great pressure on students with their schooling, especially admission into colleges, because the education policy requires a high score from a standardized examination for admission for colleges. Although South Korean education has improved with the government’s help, its excessive intervention has burdened students to be the same as other students instead of being unique.
South Korean students undergo heavy stress both mentally and physically due to education. The lives of high school students are extremely unhealthy with physical hardship. A “normal” South Korean high school student’s day does not look “normal” to western culture teenagers: “He wakes up every weekday at 6 a.m. and is at school by 7:20. He does not return home until 1:30 a.m. the next morning, after an evening spent in after-school classes and tutorial sessions at a private institute” (Choe). The high school students regard an old rule of “four versus five” as the absolute truth, which is, “You can enter the college you want if you sleep only four hours a day, but you won’t if you sleep five or more” (Choe). Therefore, many Korean students tend to become either fat or weak because they do not exercise but only study. However, their mental anxiety is much worse than their physical stress. Students can take the College Scholastic Ability Test only once a year, but it is “the most important criterion for admission into the top universities” (Card). Therefore, the pressure of the CSAT is so great that students feel nothing but empty after the examination. According to a student who finished her exam, she cried because “she realized that she had dedicated the best years of her young life to the exam and that much of her identity as a person hinged on the exam. Upon completing the exam, the force that had given her life structure and purpose was suddenly gone” (qtd in Card). Also, since students’ grades are another key factor for admission, the competition to get higher grades than other students is even more stressful than the pressure of the CSAT (Card). Although competition is essential for living in the pragmatic world, extreme competition between friends is too severe and stressful for teenagers. Living as students in South Korea, teenagers cannot have the right to enjoy their youth.
The stress on education is heavy for both students and parents, and this causes social and economic problems. Korean families make great financial investment for their children’s education. The percentage of their family incomes spent on education was 6 percent in 1980, but it increased to 11 percent in 1999 (Kim). Most of them spend for private tutoring because they know it is “absolutely necessary for admitting children in good colleges although it is highly burdensome to family life” (Kim). Many families also send their children to study abroad. Some families even emigrate to provide a less harsh classroom environment. This is not only hard for each family’s finance but also the government’s finance because people spend money to foreign countries. However, the worst problem is that the number of students who commit suicide is increasing every year. In one case, a 17-year-old distracted over his bad grades jumped from a bridge leaving a sentence on his report card, “Sorry for my irresponsibility” (Maass). Also, a high school senior left a suicide note, “I want to live in a country where there is no college examination” (Maass). Since the college a student attends “virtually determines his future for the rest of his life” (Choe) in South Korea, not doing well on the examination means “the life is over” for students. Also, they know that their parents spend huge amounts of money for their success, so the pressure is overwhelming. This crisis is not only a family’s problem but the whole country’s issue.
In order to reform the educational system, South Korean government has worked for decades, but it needs more time to change not only the system and policy but also the social perception. Frequent changes in college admission rules that the government has made confuse students. Since 2005, under the new format, high school grades are an important factor in a college’s decision to accept a student. The government thought that this policy would return students’ attention to the public education instead of private tutoring. However, students think that they have more stress because they have to care about midterms and final exams (Choe). As a result, students have more private tutoring for both the college entrance exam and their school exams. Also, the government forbid private tutoring a decade ago, but the system thrived underground (Woodard). In order to make an educational revolution, the government should work on changing the belief that getting into a prestigious university determines one’s whole life including income, status, and marriage. Therefore, the government should give more autonomy to colleges, so they can choose students who fit their philosophy, not just by the college entrance test scores but individual character. Also, schools should care about not only each student’s standardized test score but personal development and find out what the student’s talent and interest is. In addition, firms should hire their employees with their diligence and creativity not with high-status university diploma. Moreover, parents should let their kids choose what they want to do before they urge the kids to study. Educational revolution does not come without any effort to reform. Not only the government, but every element of the society should work together to change their perception about Confucian education.
Although South Korean education has problems, some developing countries such as Chile and Pakistan try to follow its education system as their role model. They praise that South Korean students achieve high scores on international math and science tests (Elliott). However, the countries should also see the drawbacks of the South Korean educational system and try to reduce them and apply the system on their conditions. In addition, Asian countries such as Taipei, China, and Taiwan have problem with their Confucian educational system. Their students also live unhealthy lives and commit suicide because of overwhelming pressure. Since Asian countries have the same concerns about education, they can share and find the solutions together. The most important thing that they need to know is that “an effective education system must be able to cope with the needs of every child, not just the academically inclined” (Yoon).
Works Cited
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Foster-Carter, Aidan. “Classroom Wars in South Korea, Part 1 an Education Paradox.” Asia Times. 2010. Google. Web. 9 Nov 2010.
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Maass, Peter. “Must-Win’s South Koreans Cram for College in Schools of Hard Knocks.” The Washington Post. 1989. ProQuest. Web. 5 Nov 2010.
Woodard, Colin. “When Rote Learning Fails Against the Test of Global Economy South Korea’s Economic Crisis Has Forced a Rethink of Confucian-style Education with ‘Test-aholic’ Students.” The Christian Science Monitor. 1998. ProQuest. Web. 5 Nov 2010.
Yoon, Suh-hyung. “Lessons in Learning.” Far Eastern Economic Review. 2002. ProQuest. Web. 5 Nov 2010.
