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By Isaac Kim
The nation's most expensive kindergarten, Uchon Kindergarten, charges a monthly fee of 1.1 million won, totaling 13.73 million won a year – more than most college tuition fees.
The Ministry of Education (MOE) charted the tuition costs of 8,559 public and private kindergartens on the e-childschoolinfo website on Sept. 1.
Private kindergartens charge an average of 191,737 won for education courses and extracurricular activities, which is 14 times more than public schools (13,285 won). The government cannot regulate tuition fees for private institutes, which may be the reason why prices are exorbitant.
The most expensive admission fees cost an additional 530,000 won (a total of 1.63 million won) for Uchon Kindergarten, followed by Hanyang Kidis (711,600 won), Gangnam University Kidergarten (705,000 won), Uimyung Kindergarten (697,000 won), and Prime Kindergarten (695,830 won).
Public institutes have a limit to how much they can charge, but there have not been any cases where education officials could find a reason to restrict high tuition fees for private institutes, drawing much criticism.
"There has been much debate about implementing a limit to the high tuition costs of kindergartens for the past three years," said one MOE official. "As soon as a bill restricting these expensive costs is passed, a new policy on private institutions will be enforced."
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