By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
A growing number of juveniles quit school due to a failure to adapt themselves to school life, financial difficulties and family issues. The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology announced Monday that some 34,000 students, accounting for 1.74 percent of all high school students, gave up their studies as of February this year.
The number of high schools students who left school has continued to increase from 23,076 in 2006 to 27,930 in 2007 and 32,943 in 2008. The dropout rate was 1.73 percent in 2008 and 1.57 in 2007.
The ministry said that poor academic ability and emotional instability caused 43 percent of the juveniles to leave the schools. About 31 percent of them quit due to financial difficulties and the divorce of their parents.
For middle schoolers, the number of students who quit school stood at 19,681, 0.52 percent of the total. It was 18,132 in primary schools, 0.98 percent of the total. Returning ratio of students was 14 percent, but some 30 percent of those who returned left again.
The ministry said it will strengthen counseling systems in cooperation with other related ministries at each school to prevent juveniles from being derailed.
Under the plan, secondary schools across the nation will hire 1,614 counseling teachers and have some 11,000 parents to voluntarily counsel students who need help. Also, 180 counseling centers, run by each regional city and province office for underprivileged juveniles, are planned to be opened by 2011.
On top of this, the ministry has decided to ease regulations on the establishment of alternative schools and build a total of 25 of these by 2011.