A North Korean defector, who had graduated from Pyongyang’s elite Kim Il Sung University, harshly denounced the South’s educational system that is centered around rote memorization, lacking creativity and is filled with excessive competition.
Zhu Seong-ha, who came to South Korea several years ago and now works as a journalist for Dong-A Ilbo, wrote in his personal web blog: “I am from North Korea, which is relatively backward in education. So, one would think that I would very envy the South’s educational system. But to be frank, I am not envious of it at all. In fact, the more I know about the reality of education in South Korea, I become even less envious.”
Zhu said he actually feels sympathy toward South Korean students who have to carry big and heavy school books everyday to survive in a society where “one’s life is forever determined by his or her high school grades” that are mostly judged by rote memorization.
“Does a society like this have international competitiveness?” he wondered.
Zhu said he now understands why some South Koreans immigrate to another country to pursue different educational opportunities.
South Korea’s die-hard competitive educational system has been long notorious. In South Korea, the name of the college where one graduates from often determines one’s life afterwards, including landing on a job, entering a prestigious social network of graduates from the same university who offer favors, including job promotion.
Zhu sees that the situation is getting further worse under the Lee administration. “After Lee Myung-back became the president, the competitive atmosphere among schools are deteriorating.”
He said the Korean society is heading toward a blind ‘educational overheating.'”
Zhu likewise criticizes the South Korean parents who compete each other to send their children to a topnotch school, by spending an inordinate amount of financial resources on their children’s education.
“Competition should happen among students, not among parents,” he said.
Also pointing out the unfair nature of competition in education where those rich families can spend more money for expensive private tutoring, and have more access to information and resources, Zhu said the perpetuation of the vicious cycle will relegate the society to a middle-age feudal system “where the lower social class always remain the bottom of the society.”