Articles by Park Jun-hee
Park Jun-hee
junheee@heraldcorp.com-
S. Korea launches tax investigation targeting star hagwon lecturers, large hagwon
South Korean tax authorities have launched tax investigations targeting star lecturers at major private academies as part of the government’s efforts to identify alleged irregularities in the operations of hagwon, or private education institutions. According to local reports and education insiders on Friday, the National Tax Service conducted a special tax audit of Hyun Woo-jin on Thursday, a math instructor at Megastudy, one of Korea’s biggest hagwon companies. The NTS is reportedly
Social Affairs June 30, 2023
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[Best Brand] SPEP offers professional English learning courses for domestic, int'l firms
At a time when English skills in the business sector play a pivotal role in communicating and securing business deals, global education firm SPEP provides tailor-made language education and human resources consulting of professionals at local and overseas companies. The business language education provider develops its learning material based on its client’s needs and wants and operates an in-house research and development center comprising international and domestic English and business
Social Affairs June 28, 2023
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Seoul waives extra subway fare for people who reboard within 10 mins
The Seoul Metropolitan Government said Wednesday that reboarding subways within 10 minutes would be free for a year starting in July. Under the new scheme, the exemption will only apply to the same transportation card the passenger used for their initial boarding, and the transfers can only be made on the same subway station route. Currently, passengers pay an additional fare if they reboard the subway after going in the wrong direction, depending on how far they have traveled, or if they have t
Social Affairs June 28, 2023
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5 Korean universities among world’s top 100
Five South Korean universities ranked among the top 100 global universities, the ranking released by QS Quacquarelli Symonds showed Wednesday. Seoul National University sat at 41st on the 20th edition of the QS World University Rankings, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) ranked 56th, Yonsei University and Korea University sat at 76th and 79th, respectively, and Pohang University of Science and Technology was 100th. For its ninth year, Massachusetts Institute of Technolog
Social Affairs June 28, 2023
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Decoding Suneung’s killer questions: what teachers say
Following a weeklong debate on the difficulty of so-called high-level “killer questions” in the Suneung, South Korea’s state-administered college entrance exam, local high school teachers said Tuesday that the killer questions are “arduously difficult,” requiring university-level knowledge beyond the scope of high school students. The math section, which delves into complex equations and requires students to solve short-answer questions without a calculator, is for
Social Affairs June 27, 2023
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Korea unveils measures to cut reliance on private education
The Education Ministry on Monday unveiled a set of comprehensive plans to alleviate private education costs for students, starting with setting up a ministry-led committee comprising public school teachers to adjust the difficulty level of the Suneung, the nation’s college entrance exam. Calling it a way of restoring the fairness of the test, the committee will eliminate the so-called “killer questions” in the exams starting from this year, saying the difficulty level of such q
Social Affairs June 26, 2023
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[헬로 한글] 이주호 교육부 장관, “외국인 대상 한국어 교육 지원, 범정부 차원으로 확대해야”
한국 드라마, 케이팝, 문화와 콘텐츠 등이 선풍적인 인기를 끌면서 한국어를 배우고자 하는 외국인의 수요도 급속히 늘어났지만, 한국어 교육 현장에 체계적인 지원을 담당하는 정부 “컨트롤 타워”는 없었다. 이주호 교육부 장관 겸 사회부총리는 최근 코리아헤럴드와의 인터뷰에서 교육부가 이 역할을 맡아 주도적으로 한국어 지원 체계를 설립, 확장하겠다고 밝혔다. 이 장관은 한국의 높아진 경제, 문화, 외교적 위상에 따라 한국어 교육 수요도 지속적으로 증가하고 있는 추세라고 말하며 교육부가 관계 부처와 기관의 역량을 총체적으로 결집하여, 보다 적극적인 교육 체계 구축을 이끌겠다고 말했다. “문체부, 외교부, 이민청, 법무부 등 다양한 부처랑 조율해서 한국을 (더 많이) 알리고, (교육부도) 변화를 준비하고 있다”라고 설명하면서 “부처 간의 협력, 연계가 미약하다는 지적을 받고 있는데, (외국인을 위한 한국어 교육을) 잘 수용할 수 있는 체
한국어판 June 26, 2023
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Is Korea’s college entrance exam too difficult?
The South Korean Education Ministry’s decision to exclude the high-level “killer questions” from the Suneung, the state-administered college entrance exam, has once again rekindled debate regarding the test’s difficulty. Arguably one of the toughest exams in the world, Korea’s College Scholastic Ability Test, commonly known as the Suneung, has played a pivotal role for decades in measuring students’ potential achievement in the future after enrolling in colleg
Social Affairs June 25, 2023
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Police, FTC join crackdown on hagwon irregularities
The Education Ministry said Thursday it has teamed up the police and the market watchdog, the Fair Trade Commission, to identify irregularities in operations of, hagwon, or private academies and institutions nationwide for next two weeks. The ministry started receiving reports on hagwon that provide one-on-one classes, run false advertisements, promote excessive spending on private education, and charge separately for textbooks. The reports can be filed on the Education Ministry's website u
Social Affairs June 22, 2023
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Ministry vows to combat false ads, irregularities in private education
Education Minister Lee Ju-ho said Wednesday the ministry will start receiving reports on irregularities in the private education industry as part of education reforms aimed at reducing the nation’s reliance on private schools and academies. The reports received by the Education Ministry will cover speculations over former test examiners providing private academies with insider information about the national college entrance exam, as well as cases of false advertising. Announcing a set of m
Social Affairs June 21, 2023
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[Hello Hangeul] Ministry to oversee Korean language education worldwide
South Korea needs a “control tower” to oversee and better manage the operation of education institutes as well as a system for Korean language learning, Education Minister Lee Ju-ho told The Korea Herald, vowing to speed up efforts to integrate state capacity currently dispersed across the related ministries. “There are criticisms that government bodies haven’t been able to cooperate and coordinate well with each other at a time when interest in the Korean language is gro
Hello Hangeul June 20, 2023
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Suneung to exclude ‘killer questions’ as part of education reform
South Korea’s state-administered college entrance exam, Suneung, will only cover materials taught in class from this year onward, excluding the so-called high-difficulty level “killer questions,” the government said Monday, sending a clear signal that it has started education sector reforms. At the consultation meeting held between the government and the ruling People Power Party, Education Minister Lee Ju-ho said the killer questions, which often test high schoolers above thei
Politics June 19, 2023
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[Weekender] A guide to surviving ‘jangma’ this summer
South Korea is expected to see more precipitation this summer. With “jangma,” or the monsoon season, just around the corner, concerns have been growing fast not just because of the possibility of heavy rainfall ruining the hard-earned summer holidays but because of lessons learned from last year. The country was deluged with severely heavy rains last year, leaving nine dead, hundreds in Seoul displaced and over 2,800 buildings damaged. This year, experts advise not to panic, even if
Social Affairs June 17, 2023
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Education Ministry to audit institution overseeing Suneung to make it ‘fair’
South Korea’s Vice Education Minister Jang Sang-yoon said Friday that the Education Ministry would audit the institution overseeing Suneung, the nation’s scholastic aptitude test, to assess the exam's fairness. Jang said the ministry would team up with the Office for Government Policy Coordination regarding when and whom it would audit, as the Korea Institute of Curriculum and Evaluation is a government body operating under the OPC, not the Education Ministry. The ministry declined t
Politics June 16, 2023
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Yoon’s comment wasn’t about ‘making Suneung easier’: presidential office
President Yoon Suk Yeol’s instruction to the chief of the Education Ministry on Thursday was not intended to mean that Suneung, or the nation’s scholastic aptitude test, should be “made easier,” his senior press secretary said Friday. “President Yoon Suk Yeol was not talking about an ‘easy Suneung’ or a ‘hard Suneung’ to Education Minister Lee Ju-ho, yesterday,” senior presidential secretary for press affairs, Kim Eun-hye, told reporter
Politics June 16, 2023
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