Value context and insight. lkm@koreatimes.co.kr
No. of multiracial students on sharp rise
By Lee Kyung-min
By Lee Kyung-min
The number of multiracial students tripled over the past seven years due to a steady increase in the number of multiracial families, data showed Monday.
This is in stark contrast to a steep decline in the “youth population” here amid the fast-aging population.
According to “youth statistics 2020” released by Statistics Korea, the number of multiracial students stood at 137,225 in 2019, accounting for 2.5 percent of the student age group.
The figure is up 12.3 percent from a year earlier, and nearly triple that of 2012 when it was 46,954.
Of the total, over three quarters were elementary school students, followed by middle school students (15.8 percent) and high school students (8.2 percent).
The steady jump comes amid a fast decline in the youth (teens to young adults in Korea) population defined as those aged between nine and 24.
The size of the age group peaked at 14.2 million in 1982 and has since been falling rapidly.
In 2020, the figure shrank to 8.5 million accounting for 16.5 percent of the total population, and is expected to drop further to 4.4 million in 2060, accounting for about 10.4 percent of the total.
A separate sub-study showed 2,017 young people died in 2018, up 3.8 percent from a year earlier. Six out of 10 were male.
The 2018 figure was the first increase in deaths following a steady decline since 2010 from 2,937 to 1,943 in 2017.
In 2018, suicide was the leading cause of their death (827), followed by accidents (420) and cancer (264).
In 2019, nearly half of student in high school students had fewer than six hours of sleep a day, while only one in nine at middle school had over six hours of sleep.
Four out of five elementary school students had eight hours of sleep or more.
About 40 percent of secondary school students said they were under heavy stress, with three out of 10 saying they had experienced depression in the past 12 months.
Over 42 percent of high school students said they felt stressed as did 37.2 percent of middle school students.
Yet, a separate sub-study showed that Korean students outperformed their global peers in 2018, measured by the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), a worldwide study conducted by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
In the study where 15-year-old students are evaluated on their scholastic performance in mathematics, science and reading, Korean students' average score was far higher than the OECD average, coming in between first and seventh among 37 countries surveyed.
Korea's average score was 526 in mathematics, higher than the OECD average 489. Korea's average in reading was 514, higher than the 487 average.
Korean students scored 519 on average in science, higher than the average 489.