By Cho Jae-hyon
City Editor
Teaching is a sacred job, isn't it? A teacher should be respected on par with a king, and father. One should not step on even the teacher's shadow. At least this is what we were taught.
However, the opposite is true in modern Korean society. Teacher authority? It plummeted a long time ago. Teachers find it increasingly more difficult to control students. Many of these kids, spoilt by their parents, don't behave.
Not only students but many parents challenge the teacher's authority. If they think their kids are not treated properly according to their own standards, they think nothing of insulting these teachers, swearing at them or even using violence.
Students are busy shuttling between cram schools until late into the night. Even primary school children attend four or five private institutes to learn math, English, Chinese, science, piano, etc. Tied to this tight schedule set up by their parents, these poor children barely find time to play with friends in the playgrounds.
At cram schools or hagwon, they compete to complete school curricula ahead of their peers. These students, already crammed with higher-level courses at hagwon, find regular school classes boring.
They find it hard to respect teachers who teach what they have already learnt at hagwon. They are just thrown into the competition to study in advance at hagwon what should be taught at school at a later time. All this is to get higher scores at exams for admission to top-tier high schools or colleges.
This war of attrition is eating away at the public education system, leaving public schools ailing and undermining teacher authority.
Korean primary and secondary students don't need policies that will fan already fierce competition for higher test scores. If they are driven into the race to squeeze out higher scores, they will be deprived of the chance to cultivate creative talents, leadership and other values that are more crucial than high scores in becoming a decent member of society.
Korean students are already struggling under a staggering academic load. They need some breathing room so that they can pause and think.
Top educators under the Lee Myung-bak administration think differently. They are forcing schools across the nation to take the state-run standardized test. It's a test that was removed a decade ago because of the lack of validation.
Why have they brought this once-dead controversial test back from the dead? They say they need it to evaluate school performances and boost competition.
The average test scores of each school are expected to be made public on each school's home page and other educational Web sites in line with the recent introduction of rules requiring schools to disclose key operating information.
Schools and students will fall into ranks accordingly. This will brew acute conflicts and enormous trouble going forward. That's because it will widen the performance gap between schools. Poorly performing schools will inevitably face various disadvantages.
Then what? Teachers will come under pressure to do whatever steps are necessary to raise the scores, adding a burden to students in the end.
In Korea where education zeal is mind boggling, all issues about education cannot come in black and white. It's a knotty issue that is intertwined with other social and economic factors. For instance, the ranking of schools will eventually influence home prices. Few know what the closer linkage between school performances and home prices will bring about in the future.
After all, this test is not that simple. It needed a thorough examination before being enforced. From the revision of history text books to remove what it calls left-leaning content to this controversial test, the Lee administration is adopting a divide and rule approach that always triggers conflict.
The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education recently fired seven unionized teachers, holding them accountable for allowing students to go on field trips on the day of the state-run test in October. It said they were fired as they breached the Civil Servant Law obliging them to be ``faithful and obedient'' to their employer, the government.
On Tuesday, a number of students and teachers boycotted the test again. The authorities are warning that all disobeying teachers will be punished.
Whenever a new president takes office, the whole nation undergoes a big shift in policies. Education policies are not exceptional here. But these are not something that can be tempered or changed so often. Civil servants are often called ``soulless'' due to their obedience to whatever policies are enacted under new chiefs.
It's true that the teachers who allowed their students not to take the test disobeyed an order from above. But they can be called at least civil servants with a soul who disobeyed the order to serve their students in line with their conscience.
Whether the test is necessary or not is disputable. But the test is divisive. And voices against it should be heeded. Guaranteeing teachers autonomy is one of the key ingredients essential for teacher authority. The government should rethink whether dismissing teachers is the right answer.