Hagwon Curfew Backsliding
By Kang Shin-who
Staff Reporter
A 10 p.m. curfew on "hagwon," or cram schools, pushed by a top presidential aide last year to reduce runaway private education costs, is backfiring.
According to the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology, Thursday, local government councils, except in Seoul, have decided not to implement the curfew.
Education council members of city and provincial governments are now opposing the policy, claiming that the curfew is not effective in taming private education costs. If they fail to implement the curfew by decree by the end of June, the plan will be scrapped.
The idea came about last April, when Kwak Seung-jun, head of the President Council for Future and Vision announced the government planned to legally prevent hagwon from operating after 10 p.m.
He also showed his determination at that time by saying he was willing to mobilize police to enforce the law.
However, his plan, proposed without consulting related ministries, invited immediate criticism.
The education ministry along with both governing and opposition parties criticized Kwak for his remarks, saying he was not in a position to comment on education reform.
They also claimed it was hard for a small number of education officials to supervise and control tens of thousands of private education institutes nationwide.
Many hagwon owners opposed the plan saying Korea would be an absurd country where policemen curb students who want to learn more.
Parents were also pessimistic, calling for the government to first address principal education problems. Some say "soaring private education costs are not solely caused by operating hours of hagwon."
The ministry and lawmakers of the governing Grand National Party (GNP) agreed not to restrict hagwon hours by law, but rather let each city and provincial education office set its own curfew, according to the regional situation.
For example, Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education is banning private cram schools running after 10 p.m., while Gyeonggi Provincial Office of Education set the time limit to 11 p.m. for middle school students and 12 a.m. for high school pupils. But these rules don't have any legal binding.
Instead, they vowed to tightly supervise any irregularities by hagwon and introduced financial reward programs for citizens who report hagwon breaking the law or regulations.
At the same time, the government has expanded after-school programs and teacher evaluation systems to improve the quality of public education.
Earlier, a group of hagwon operators along with parents and students in Seoul and Busan filed a petition with the Constitutional Court, claiming the curfew violated the educational rights of parents and students.
However, the court last October ruled in favor of limiting operating hours of private cram schools.