Education News

First out of the blocks, a chance for sharp-eyed English-speakers to earn some money: the Korean Tourism Organization is offering a reward to photogs who submit signs in muddled, Konglishy English found at "tourist spots". No precise definition of tourist spot, and road signs, restaurant menus and guidebooks are not eligible, as KTO doesn't have jurisdiction over them. Still, an interesting concept, and a chance to get a W50,000 debit card for your efforts. Click here for more.

The Chosun Ilbo carried a report last week of a study done by SMOE (my employer) analyzing the results of a survey "conducted among 28,761 students, 11,980 parents, 2,406 Korean English teachers, and 595 native English-speaking teaching assistants at 1,282 primary and secondary schools in Seoul."

The survey found that Koreans are still quite conflicted about having native speaking teachers run their English classrooms: less than one-third of parents and students "preferred" native speakers to Korean teachers with good English skills, though about 60% are "more satisfied" with the teaching job being done by foreign teachers. IOW, yes, you do a better job, but we still don't want you here--aka, having our cake and eating it too.

Speaking of which, English success not cake, the CSAT or suneung results have been published, and some 17,000 of the exam's 648,946 takers aced the English section.

The Korea Institute of Curriculum and Evaluation (KICE), announcing the scores of the 2012 CSAT [Wednesday], said that 171 people this year received perfect scores on the exam’s three core subjects - Korean language, mathematics and English - compared to 11 last year.

Post-exam bellyaching is an annual sport here, as people complain the exam was too hard if there aren't enough perfect scorers, or that it's too easy if there are too many. The testing authority aims for 1%, but never seems to hit that mark.

As if to make a point, the JoongAng printed elsewhere this story: Student’s perfect CSAT is all his own, about Baek Ju-hong, who aced the suneung without the benefit of hagwons, thus proving the effectiveness of public education.

...Or the inteligence, inquisitiveness and hard work of an individual student:

An avid reader, Baek said, “In the countryside, where there is not a single college prep hagwon, the only way to develop logical thinking skills was by reading many different books.”
Baek said he also had a head start with his parents, who were avid readers themselves.

수능달인

... You, too, can be a 수능달인, suneung dalin or Korean SAT expert. Just eat our glutinous rice cakes!


For a mere W 20,000, you are sure to get the university acceptance letter you desire, with this collection of lucky baked goods from Tous les Jours.




E-Mart seems to specialize in chocolate products to improve one's suneung score, from Dr. Yoo to Hershey's to Ferrero Rocher. The Ferrero Rocher display is all about the "Golden Bell", a TV quiz show. According to this article, other products you can buy to boost your suneung expertise include a math-formula cushion to enhance your bedtime studies, portable oxygen tanks, and a suneung watch which makes no disruptive ticking sound--and also indicates when test-takers should move on to the next section.

The "D-1" on the Golden Bell display, by the way, is the countdown of days left before the big exam. Yes, it's tomorrow!

The suneung exam is a spectacularly big deal in Korea; the second Thursday in Novemember is the one time the university entrance exam is offered, and it is therefore the one day to which every high school student's whole academic career has been building.

Students and their families and their schools try to obtain every possible advantage, naturally. Special study mats, yeot and beef-octopus porridge might not help, but they might, so why risk it?

My high school only met during first period today, for two reasons: 1) underclassmen need to clean up the school, since SAT-takers will be arriving for the exam tomorrow; and, 2) so they can then go set up cheering groups at the school where the seniors will go to take their exam (somewhere in Yeongdeungpo-gu).

Tomorrow is a school holiday, except for the unfortunate seniors, and most businesses will open late to decrease traffic congestion, in order to make sure seniors can get to their testing site on time.

That's another reason the school day is so short today: seniors have to go scope out their testing site to make sure there is no confusion tomorrow. So in addition to seeing wandering, out-of-place students, you see signs like these, at least in the subway:


At the entrance to the school was posted this board, being examined by one of our students. It indicates where they are to go for their exam tomorrow, and also maps out the locations for students coming to Young-il as their testing site.


Good luck! Eat your omega-3s tonight, and get to sleep early--preferably on your math-formula pillow!

This Week in Korean Education

I count four stories of interest in the week's online editions of the main rags. First up, do politics and education make good bedfellows?

Here's a great quote from a university student Choi, a law student who declined to give his full name to the Korea Herald for its story:

“One of my professors focuses too much on his political activities. Thus, his students, including myself, feel he has been negligent of his duty to teach and do research,” he said.
“Fortunately, his political views were quite similar to mine, so I was not offended. But many others with different views might have been annoyed when he expressed his views during his class.”

I imagine they might be, yes. The article, or thinly-disguised editorial by one of the right-leaningest paps, decries the involvement of popular professors, or "polifessors" [ugh] in the Seoul mayoral election to replace Oh Se-hoon.

One wonders if the story would have hit the presses had not Park Won-soon gotten the nod of the electorate, and pushed the poltical landscape a little further to the left than the KH editorial board likes. Park was an independent candidate, but with decidedly leftist tendencies.

In America, by comparison, Fox News and other right-leaning media doesn't utter a peep when, say, Georgia State University professor Newt Gingrich attempts to wield influence, but let a Barak Obama run for office, it's all effete intellectual professors of law trying to destroy the country...

So what do Korean university bosses think or say about this? Any policies guiding politics in the classroom? Apparently not, as:

Some critics also pointed out that as most professors joining politics and public service take a long leave of absence from their schools, young scholars cannot find permanent positions despite the vacancies.
Universities appear to be reluctant to take them off their payrolls as their activities in high-profile public positions help promote their schools.

Second, a weird story from Gwangju in Jeollanam-do, regarding a parent that injured himself in front of a group of teachers while complaining about treatment his daughter had received while being reprimanded by a teacher at the school.

According to the KT report, he had picked up a chair as if to attack the teacher during a meeting, then decided to use a tape dispenser, with which he cut himself. The father later apologized, and no charges were filed.

I am unclear about who the charges would be filed by in this, but in America, it's altogether possible the father would sue the school for having dangerous weapons like tape dispensers at hand.

Joong-Ang Daily had the only story I found on the Bureau of Audit and Inspection's report on university finances. Which is odd, because it's a blockbuster that should play into the hands of those who want to stymie the power of the education elites here. In essence, top managers at numerous schools have defrauded them of monies ranging from thousands to over ten million US dollars!

Not surprisingly, some universities take umbrage with the "interim report", complaining among other things that it's none of the government's business what they do with non-government money.

To be fair, academic independence is critical to a democracy, but that independence precludes both government and other power-brokers from excessive fiduciary entanglements. Also, when faculty members subvert the application process in favor of faculty children, that's particularly appalling here, where the application process is such a gauntlet. Speaking of which ...

The Suneung 수능 exam will take place this Thursday; it is the Korean SAT, offered once a year, and the only chance for most high school seniors to get into university.

It is not the only way, however, as some top students can get in via the "admission officer" system devised by the current administration to recognise superior students; and the early admissions system, which is much the same, and consists of a series of high-stress interviews with admissions officers.

I have been helping one of my students prepare for this exam process during periodic lunch breaks and free periods in the last few months: I give him a topic, a question and five minutes; he gives a five to seven minute response, including follow-up questions; then we debrief his answers.

He is an extremely bright kid with outstanding English skills, and while he got a lot better during this process, I can't take much credit. At the end of last week, he informed me that he got admission into his first choice, the Underwood International College of Yonsei--among the most prestigious placements in all of Korea.

Anyway, I mention this to bring you up to speed on the following story, about a kid with "sixth-grade scores" meaning "bottom forty percent of his school" who got into Hanyang University, one of the top schools, which requires "first-grade" scores. (My student 외수 earned "first-grade" scores at Young-il.)

Lee Kyu-hyeok used the admissions officer system to by-pass the suneung. Bribes? Powerful family? Blackmail? Creating an innovative software program that improves the performance of smartphones?

“When I was a senior at middle school, I bought the Blackjack Samsung smartphone. But it was too slow and sometimes stopped operating. I began work to repair it and made Kyuhyeok Rom. I thought it would be useful for other people, I distributed the software via the Internet blog, http://kyuhyuk.kr,” Lee said.

I'm not sure how well this guy will do in college, but I'm glad to see any signs that the suneung is losing its vice-like grip on the Korean educational system. Perhaps someday, English classes will teach students to actually speak English rather than to prepare for a nitpicky hour of grammar questions that are unrelated to English usage.

Education News Wrap

Time for the weekly *cough, cough* post about what's going on in education here on the peninsula. And this one is particularly interesting, or at least [your adjective here] since it crystallizes some of the key issues in Korean education.


First up, there is "the problem with an easy CSAT prep test", the problem being that too many Moms complained that the test does not allow their particular genius children to shine, since there was just too much shiny-ness.


It’s an important issue because CSAT scores are weighed heavily by universities in their admissions criteria. “If the official CSAT this year is this easy, getting just one problem wrong will place you in the second level,” said Park Su-jin of Seoul Foreign Language High School. Park is in charge of helping students at the school with their university admissions.

“Because of this [exam], it will be harder on the students.”

One might suggest that the best action on an easy exam is not getting just one problem wrong. That's what Norfolk & Chance did last Thursday at 3AP in winning the Trivia Contest, after all. But this is Korea, and it's always more complicated than that:


[Previously] KICE came under heavy criticism from parents. Last year, only 11 brought home a score of 100 percent for those sections. The prep test is intended to be used a barometer for students to determine their readiness for November’s CSAT. [...]

This isn’t the first time KICE [Korea Institute for Curriculum Evaluation] has come under fire for the CSAT’s difficulty level, which was introduced in 2008. Every year, parents complain that it is either too difficult or too easy. Korean students often compare it to water or fire.

It’s an important issue because CSAT scores are weighed heavily by universities in their admissions criteria.

So, which is the greater problem, that the test can be by turns judged--by less than impartial parties--too easy or too hard, or that a single test, administered on one and only one day in November, is weighed so heavily in in college admissions?


Next, three recent stories concerned the digital age and the Korean student. Yonhap News via KH describes the results of an OECD study on digital literacy. The story begins with the sentence:


Young South Koreans learn the best from computers and the Internet according to a survey of 15 year-olds in 19 countries, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development said on Monday.

This sentence is a total--and typical--misunderstanding of the report. It really says that Korean students, thanks to their unwholesome addiction to PC bangs and MMRPGs like Starcraft, have a head start on digital reading. Reading. They can read from a computer screen better ... and "their ability to solve problems using the Internet is even better,” a Seoul Education Ministry official said, without a shred of evidence for his statement from the study.


Even an occasional reader of this blog knows I am as techno-savvy as most teachers and more so than most with similar hair-hue; at my school I am the "God of Powerpoint" since I seem able to bend that program to my will. I bought into the Internet for homework information, cool links and interactive assignments when they could be found, long ago. I totally believe in the power of technology for good, and of course, for ill.


All textbooks to go digital by 2015, announces another KH headline, stating that soon students in all age groups will be able to access textbooks and activity books using smartphones, tablet PCs and so on. This is a good thing.


Citing the best score South Korea garnered in an OECD digital reading survey, the Education Ministry believes that the digital platforms will bring about a sea change in the classroom and boost the country’s educational competitiveness.

Oh, dear. Well, see, no. That's not ... um, [sigh] Or, put it this way:


The problem we face now, however, is an exaggerated trust in digital education. Some people wrongfully assume that the quality of academic activity will improve with the use of multimedia digital material instead of conventional textbooks. However, without a teacher’s guidance, the impact of digital textbooks may fall short of expectations. There is a risk that digital textbooks will only aggravate addiction to the Internet among the young, when 12.8 percent of students are already suffering from this condition.


The above is from a JoongAng Ilbo editorial titled Smart education, not lazy teachers, which does a reasonable job lying out context for the e-textbook, teachers, and the computer-based classroom in the 21st century. Many in the educational administration field, especially the political wing--in Korea and America and probably everywhere--seem to view technology as a money-saver: more technology units=less teacher units. Certainly, quality interactive materials can free a teacher's time from rote processes like grading, but they cannot replace the truly interactive experience that is at the heart of education: teacher-student face time.

Can We Make A Difference?

At a get-together a few nights ago, one of my fellow English teachers here in Korea was feeling frustrated: after nearly three years of teaching here, he has not been able to really make a difference in the way his school works; by extension, we foreigners will never be able to make positive change in the Korean educational system.

I feel his pain. After three years, I still can't get my co-teachers to speak English in my presence at English Department meetings--well, at least not until sam-cha (third round), when the libations have loosened lips somewhat. Each new department head has asked me for my opinion on what the school can do to improve my effectiveness. My answer is: 1) give me smaller classes; or 2) more class hours per week with my students; or 3) at least stream the classes by English ability levels; and 4) periodic, regular meetings with my co-teachers. So far, none of those things has been implemented.

The Korean educational system, not unlike education bureaucracies anywhere, seems particularly entrenched. Although one can trace numerous attempts by national administration after administration to decrease the reliance on after-school academies (hakwons), to change the memorization-based, rote-learning culture of instruction, to encourage creativity, and to raise the level of education for the poor and middle class, most who follow education policy here would agree that nothing has really gotten better.

An article in the JoongAng Daily a few days ago illustrates this point, with a a story titled The widening educational divide. Acceptance rates to Korea's most prestigious universities is proportionally much higher for so-called autonomous or special-purpose schools than for "ordinary" high schools. Of course, that's one of the goals of the autonomous school idea. Key grafs:

A closer look at the numbers shows that the overall number of students accepted by the best universities in the country from normal high schools started to decline beginning in 1974 - when the standardization of high schools began. One school in Seoul that sent 67 students to Seoul National University in 1981, had only six successful applicants last year.
The standardization of high schools was implemented by the government in an attempt to narrow the gap in the quality of education received by the rich and the rest, and root out memorization-based education methods. This meant getting rid of all entrance exams that high schools utilized prior to 1974 and assigning students to random schools.
But what was meant to broaden the quality of education, ended up having the opposite effect. Indeed, the Korean education system has never been more polarized, and a memorization-based approach to learning prevails throughout Korean schools.

If the Korean government can't fix it over a period of thirty-five years, I don't think a few thousand foreign English teachers will do it within our typical two to five years tenure.

But can we make a difference in our little realm? After all, many of us are given minimal guidance on our curriculum and classroom activities--what we may see as an annoyance can be an opportunity to make a difference. Think outside the box, focus less on grammar and more on communication; have students move and act rather than sit passively; create a scene or a stir (in a good way, of course), let the powers-that-be know you're here and you're serious about teaching.

My friend has done just this at his school: he reads storybooks at lunchtime; he teaches an afterschool science class; and so on. In fact, his school recently won an award from the city for its outstanding English program! I think it's fair to say he has made a difference. Alas, the presentation of the award, and some great perks, were lavished on the Korean faculty members, and he was completely ignored. Such thoughtlessness is inexcusable, of course, so I won't try to excuse it--still, this isn't the first time a foreigner has been slighted in this way, and it won't be the last. Hurts your feelings, naturally, but it doesn't decrease your impact.

Teaching in Korea can be frustrating; cultural differences like han and nunchi cause us to stumble and misunderstand things, to create rifts of which we are unaware, and to offend or be offended where no offense is meant. Open criticism is not something familiar to Korean, or indeed Asian, culture, at least on a one-to-one basis. When my lesson has not gone well, my co-teachers will not critique it for me; lacking a meeting protocol where they would be comfortable in critiquing me, I have had to figure out ways to ask for their input whereby I am not directly on the line. When I need them to change their ways, I approach them with I am having trouble with so-and-so; what do you think it is? Perhaps you can help me by doing such-and-such.

I would guess most foreign teachers would point to the testing culture as the biggest problem with Korean education--a student's entire future seems to boil down to one nine hour period on a Thursday in November of their senior year, the Korean SAT, or 수능 suneung. In order to get into prestigious universities, Korean students must forego sports, dating, and fun to attend cram schools, spend untold hours in "self-study rooms" and, in too many cases, contemplate suicide.

But so would Korean teachers. They are just as frustrated with their inability to change the system as we are. Well, much more.

Despite all the English grammar and vocabulary they are taught, the average high schooler has great difficulty putting together a simple English sentence expressing their own thoughts.

So I no longer worry about the "average high schooler"--I confine myself to my own, the ones at my school. Through practice and repetition, by giving them need and means, I will make it easier and easier for them to express a simple thought well in English. Then a slightly more complex one. And so on.

Of course, it's neither simple or easy. And I'll never change the system. But the occasional success is reward enough to keep me going, and the paycheck doesn't hurt, either.

Size Matters

... at least when it comes to your score on the SAT essay section.  Didn't know the SAT has an essay section?  You're not alone--my informal survey on this question found one out of two people didn't know the SAT even has an essay section, which is 50% of the sample.  The other 50% couldn't remember what SAT stands for.  Mind you, this survey has a margin of error of + or - (whichever the case may be) 15,000 per cent.

My survey is slightly less scientific (but only slightly) than that performed by a New York high school student and reported by ABC News: Has Teen Unlocked the Secret to a Better SAT Score?  Nebbishy fourteen-year-old Milo Beckman has taken the SAT twice, and found that even though his second essay was factually inaccurate and generally inferior, it earned a higher score.

It was longer:

"My hypothesis is that longer essays on the SAT essay component score higher," he said.
So he asked his fellow students at New York City's Stuyvesant High School to count how many lines they had written on their essays and to provide their scores.
"I thought, 'This ought to be interesting.' I've always wondered about this, too," said David Sugarman, a classmate.
"This was something directly related to the SAT itself and the means by which, you know, we were being graded," another classmate, Yana Azova, said.
Milo says out of 115 samples, longer essays almost always garnered higher scores.
"The probability that such a strong correlation would happen by chance is 10 to the negative 18th. So 00000 …18 zeros and then (an) 18. Which is zero," he said.

Me?  I kinda wonder what are the chances that it's really an 18 after those 18 zeroes?

Another thing I wonder is, why has a 14-year-old already taken the SAT twice?  I only took it once, as a high school senior, and that was under duress.  Back then, the top score was something like 23.  Today, you can get 14 million on your SAT.  And you still might not get into Harverd. 

The ABC News story follows up Milo's research with some MIT professor's insane blathering about how to do well on this (largely imaginary, according to my research) essay section, including such advice as memorize some big words and sprinkle them randomly throughout your writing, and conclude your paper with a quote by a famous person, even if it is totally unrelated to your topic, and even if you don't really remember it well enough to get it right.  I hasten to add that I am NOT making this part up.  

Which explains why I didn't get into MIT.  As the poet Sherman Helmsley said, "I am the Captain of my Fate, I am the something something here in Seoul."

N.B.: My first post on this blog is a copy of a post on my other blog, The Seoul Patch. This will be the way of things for a while, to some extent, as I migrate my education/classroom/teaching stuff to this--more serious--blog address.