Koreans back essay questions on college entrance exam — but not yet

Deliberative panel of 180 citizens reaches conditional consensus on college admissions reform

72.8% support expanding essay-style questions in high school grades

Only 5.5% back immediate rollout across all subjects on CSAT

Scoring fairness tops list of concerns at 48.3%

After a two-day deliberation on college admissions policy, 180 citizens reached what amounted to a conditional endorsement of reform. Pictured is the hagwon district in Daechi-dong, Seoul. [Yonhap]

"Essay-style questions on the college entrance exam are necessary. Just not right now."

That was the essence of the answer delivered by 180 citizens after a two-day deliberative session on college admissions policy — a verdict closer to conditional approval than outright endorsement. A majority said introducing essay and short-answer questions to the College Scholastic Ability Test was necessary, but opinions diverged sharply on when and how. Only 5.5% supported rolling out such questions across all subjects at once, while the largest share of respondents said the change should take effect in the 2037–2038 academic year, when students currently in first and second grade of elementary school will sit the exam. After the deliberation, support for essay-style CSAT questions actually declined, making the case for a slower, more cautious approach all the clearer.

According to a deliberative findings report released Thursday by the National Education Commission, 55.5% of the 180 citizen panel members who took part in the Aug. 29–30 session said introducing essay and short-answer questions to the CSAT was necessary. Of those, 23.3% said it was "very necessary" and 32.2% said it was "necessary." On the other side, 25.0% said it was unnecessary and 16.7% said it was not necessary at all, putting total opposition at 41.7%.

Caution grew over the course of the deliberation. Before the session, 58.3% of participants said such questions were necessary; afterward, that figure fell to 55.5%, a drop of 2.8 percentage points. Those saying the change was unnecessary rose from 37.8% to 41.7%, an increase of 3.9 percentage points. Twenty-two participants shifted from supporting the change to opposing it, while 15 moved in the opposite direction. Those who changed their minds against the reform cited the need for adequate preparation — including a concrete road map, a reliable scoring system and a pilot program — before any rollout.

Preferences on how to implement the change also leaned heavily toward a phased approach. The most common response, at 36.7%, was to introduce essay questions in select subjects first and then expand to all subjects. Another 30.0% favored introducing them in select subjects only. Opposition to any introduction stood at 26.7%, while support for an immediate across-the-board rollout was limited to 5.5% — down from 12.2% before the deliberation, a drop of more than half.

Respondents also favored keeping the share of essay and short-answer questions low, at least initially. The most common response, at 42.8%, was that such questions should make up less than 40 percent of the exam. Another 17.2% said 40 to 60 percent would be appropriate, 8.9% said more than 60 percent, and 3.3% said all questions should be in essay or short-answer format. Those opposed to including any such questions at all accounted for 26.7%.

A report on the deliberative findings of the citizen panel on college admissions policy showed that 55.5% of the 180 panel members said introducing essay and short-answer questions to the CSAT was necessary. [Provided by the National Education Commission / produced with ChatGPT]

On timing, 39.4% of respondents chose the 2037–2038 academic year as the appropriate point of introduction — the period when students currently in first and second grade of elementary school will take the CSAT. The 2033–2034 academic year was chosen by 21.7%, and 2035–2036 by 11.1%. Support for the 2037–2038 window rose sharply through the deliberation, climbing from 22.8% before the session to 39.4% afterward, a gain of 16.7 percentage points. By contrast, support for the earlier 2033–2034 window fell from 31.1% to 21.7%.

Scoring fairness was cited as the biggest concern about introducing essay-style questions to the CSAT. Worries about an expansion of private tutoring and the difficulty of preparing through school education alone each came in at 13.9%, while concerns about grading a large-scale exam within a short time frame stood at 11.1%.

Demands for reliable scoring also dominated responses on what preparations would be needed before any reform. Panelists rated the importance of disclosing grading criteria and establishing an appeals process at 4.59 out of 5. Designing questions aligned with the school curriculum scored 4.55, training and securing specialist teacher-graders scored 4.30, and developing and distributing an AI-assisted scoring support system scored 4.22.

There was comparatively broader support for expanding essay and short-answer questions in high school grades. Some 72.8% of respondents said it was necessary to increase the share of such questions in high school midterm and final exams, while 22.8% said it was not. Even so, support here also dipped slightly — from 76.1% before the deliberation to 72.8% afterward, a decline of 3.3 percentage points.

When asked what direction future college admissions policy should pursue, the most common answer — chosen by 23.7% — was ensuring fairness, objectivity and reliability in assessment and selection. Evaluating the competencies needed for future society and using admissions reform to drive change in school education and learning each followed at 20.2%.

The National Education Commission said it plans to continue public deliberation on specific policy issues based on the findings. It also said it will analyze results from field forums and online opinion surveys on college admissions reform and report to the full commission in October.

brunch@heraldcorp.com