New Education Plan Backfiring
By Kang Hyun-kyung
Staff Reporter
The presidential transition team said Sunday it will strengthen the publicity of English education and other programs unveiled last week.
Educators and parents have expressed worries over the reform plan, saying it would only raise household spending on private education.
Chairwoman Lee Kyung-sook countered the skepticism, saying once the public understands the big picture of the education plan, they'll realize that they don't need to worry about it.
``There seems to be a misunderstanding of the plan,'' Lee said.
``The plan is not a quick fix. In fact, it is a reflection of 10 to 20 years of research efforts on key educational issues,'' she added.
The transition team is scheduled to hold a hearing on the educational reform with experts on Wednesday to raise awareness.
Based on the results, the team plans to present a complete roadmap to English education early next month.
According to the unveiled plan, high school students will be asked to take an English ability test from 2013 and submit their scores for college admissions.
With the adoption of the plan, the current score-ranking system, which classifies the students' academic ability from level 1 through 9 based on the scores each student earned in the college scholastic ability test, will be replaced by the new ranking system.
The reform proposal also said the incoming government will phase in English-language content courses for the upper elementary school graders to tackle soaring household spending on private education.
Shortly after the announcement, the educational reform plan was met with skepticism from educators and parents.
They said the proficiency test would motivate parents to look at private education for their children.
As a result, household spending on private education will go up, instead of going down, they said.
Schoolteachers opposed the plan, claiming they are not fully prepared to take classes in English.
A recent survey showed that less than 50 percent of English teachers are able to take a class in English.
Facing criticism, President-elect Lee Myung-bak said there is misconception regarding his team's plan to reform English education.
``The team decided to unveil the plan after testing it for many years,'' he said.
Lee said if the reform plan is set in place, parents do not need to spend for private English tutoring.
He said he would strengthen public education and students will not feel that they need to get private tutoring to get university admissions.