Korea's three major teacher organizations urge normalization of high school education

Students choosing courses for grades, not interest, groups warn

Calls to scrap non-completion rule, expand permanent staff, bolster basic learning support

Groups say fairness and classroom conditions must be verified before essay-test expansion

Members of the Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations, the Teachers' Labor Union Federation and the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union hold a press conference outside the National Council on Educational Policy at Government Complex Seoul in Sejong-ro, Seoul, calling for improvements to the proposed administrative notice on the high school credit system. [Yonhap]
Members of the Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations, the Teachers' Labor Union Federation and the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union hold a press conference outside the National Council on Educational Policy at Government Complex Seoul in Sejong-ro, Seoul, calling for improvements to the proposed administrative notice on the high school credit system. [Yonhap]

South Korea's three major teacher organizations have called on the government to switch career and interdisciplinary elective courses to absolute grading and hire more permanent teachers to address what they describe as deepening chaos in the high school credit system.

The Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations, the Teachers' Labor Union Federation and the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union held a joint press conference Thursday outside the main gate of Government Complex Seoul, urging the normalization of high school education.

The groups said the high school credit system — designed to let students choose courses based on their career interests — is clashing with a university entrance process that demands grade competition. They said that since career elective courses, previously assessed on an absolute scale, were brought under a relative grading system, students have been gravitating toward courses that yield better grades rather than those they actually want to study.

Educational inequality tied to school size was also flagged as a problem. Smaller schools lack sufficient teachers and course offerings, forcing students to rely on online classes or outside institutions, the groups said. Teachers, meanwhile, are being buried under mounting workloads — covering multiple subjects, conducting assessments, maintaining student records and providing remedial instruction.

Song Su-yeon, chairwoman of the Teachers' Labor Union Federation, cited survey results from a poll of 1,197 high school teachers conducted by the secondary teachers' union from July 20 to Aug. 3, saying 98.2 percent of respondents called for a full review, abolition or sweeping overhaul of the high school credit system. She added that 76.1 percent said student competition and stress had increased since the introduction of the five-tier internal grading system.

"How can you take responsibility for the next round of reforms when you haven't even solved the problems we have now?" Song said. "Students in smaller schools have limited course choices because of a shortage of teachers and available subjects, so the educational gap between schools of different sizes must be addressed first."

The groups said remedies must be put in place quickly, as students who will be the first to fall fully under the high school credit system next year are set to sit the 2028 university entrance exam. Along with switching career and interdisciplinary elective courses to absolute grading, they called for a review of what they described as an excessively fragmented course structure and semester system. They also said the government must present university entrance remedies and an implementation timeline to ensure current students face no new disadvantages.

The organizations also urged the abolition of the non-completion rule and the minimum achievement level guidance requirement, calling instead on education offices to establish a basic learning support framework backed by dedicated staffing and budgets. Kang Ju-ho, chairman of the Korean Federation of Teachers' Associations, said, "We must put an end to the practice of piling on more work without adding more teachers and patching the gaps in the system through teachers' dedication."

On the National Council on Educational Policy's push to expand essay and descriptive assessments in university entrance exams, the groups said securing enough teachers and class time for students to read, discuss and write adequately must come first. They warned that changing the exam format without verifying the time needed for question-setting and grading, the fairness of assessments, how complaints would be handled and who would bear responsibility for errors could widen both the burden on students and educational inequality.

Park Yeong-hwan, chairman of the Korean Teachers and Education Workers' Union, said a survey of 1,424 teachers nationwide conducted from Sept. 21 to Friday found that 70.4 percent opposed introducing essay and descriptive questions into the College Scholastic Ability Test.

"Is there a reason to push a policy whose expected problems are clear but whose benefits are not?" Park said. "Teachers are not the target of reform — they are its driving force." He called for classroom voices to be reflected in policy.

The three groups formally requested meetings with the education minister and the chairman of the National Council on Educational Policy. They called for the establishment of a consultative body with equal participation from teachers, students, parents, education authorities and universities, and demanded that an improvement schedule be made public.

"Three years of high school cannot be given back to students," the groups said. "Before talking about the education of the future, the National Council on Educational Policy and the Ministry of Education must first take responsibility for the schools of today."


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