By Kim Tae-jong
Households spent 290,000 won ($255) monthly in private education costs per preschooler on average last year, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education (SMOE) said Thursday.
The figure comes from a survey the education office conducted on 1,427 households in Seoul. Figures comparable with the previous years were not available.
As fees for art, piano and taekwondo lessons were excluded from the survey, the actual cost of private education could be much higher.
Choi Sang-chul, a 34-year-old office worker living in Seoul, spends about 1 million won per month on private education for his two children, saying it is the heaviest burden in his household budget.
“It’s quite a burden to send them to kindergarten and cover education costs,” Choi said. “But the real problem is the expenses for education will get higher as they get older.”
According to the report, an average household spent 420,000 won for a child in elementary school and 568,000 won for a middle school student.
The report also said the financial and educational status of parents was the key factor determining the expense of private education in household budget, saying the richer and more educated parents are, the more they spend on private education for their children.
The report shows households with a monthly income of less than 1.9 million won spent 245,000 won for private education per child per month while those who made over 6 million won spent 800,000 won.
In the family where fathers only hold a high school diploma the average was 370,000 won while those with a bachelor’s degree spent 720,000 won a month.
Although parents spend a considerable amount of money on the education of their children, they are reluctant to be in contact with the teachers.
In the survey, about 57 percent of the respondents said they talk to teachers of their children once a semester. About 28 percent said they don’t visit the school and contact the teacher personally, and only 1.2 percent said they visit the school once a month.
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