Would longer school days keep kids out of private academies? Korea weighs controversial fix

By Hankookilbo

• Published Sep 4, 2026 5:00 PM KST

Gov't hopes longer classes will reduce reliance on academies, but teachers say it merely delays the daily cycle

The National Education Commission is debating extending the school day for first- and second-graders, sparking a clash between policymakers and educators.

Supporters argue that aligning instruction time with the OECD average will reduce parents' reliance on private tutoring centers, known as hagwons in Korean. However, teachers' groups warn that longer classes will merely delay the daily after-school hagwon cycle without solving the underlying gap in after-school care.

The commission, the National Assembly Futures Institute and the Korean Educational Development Institute held a joint policy forum on Thursday at the National Assembly Library. The event marked the commission's first public debate on lengthening the school day for young students.

Shorter school days strain working parents

Hwang In-hyeok and Seong Mun-ju, associate research fellows at the National Assembly Futures Institute, presented data showing a severe gap in instructional time. Korean elementary students receive 655 hours of instruction a year, falling about 22 percent, or 190 hours, short of the OECD average of 845 hours. This total is more than 100 hours less than in Japan and Germany, which mandate 768 and 774 hours respectively, the shortest among the Group of Seven nations.

The gap is widest for first- and second-graders. These students receive just 581 hours of instruction a year, which is 28.7 percent, or 234 hours, less than the OECD average of 815 hours.

This deficit creates a sudden lack of after-school childcare when children enter elementary school. While preschoolers often spend time in day care centers or kindergartens until 4 or 5 p.m., regular classes for early elementary students end around 1 p.m. Even with Neulbom School, a state-run childcare program, the day typically finishes by 3 p.m.

Hwang said that parents navigate this gap by either adjusting their work hours through parental leave or turning to private education.

Parental leave for mothers peaks at 83.8 percent during a child's first year, plunges to between 2.6 and 3.1 percent for ages 1 through 5, and spikes back to 12.5 percent when the child turns 6 and enters school. Parental leave for fathers remains flat at around 10 percent during the early years before surging to 18 percent at age 6.

This demand directly fuels private education. According to a National Data Agency survey, 46 percent of dual-income households rely on hagwons and 55 percent rely on art or sports programs purely for childcare. For single-income households, those figures drop to 11 percent and 19 percent, respectively.

Researchers also warned that this early academic pressure may be harming children's mental health. They cited data showing that mental health visits for children aged 5 to 9 surged from roughly 30,000 in the mid-2010s to about 58,000 in 2024.

Lee Hui-hyeon, head of the Student and Parent Research Office at the Korean Educational Development Institute, proposed a phased expansion of class time.

"While early childhood education integrates play and care throughout the day, elementary school abruptly fragments a child's day among school, after-school care, hagwons and home," she said. "The first stage would add 3.35 periods a week to match third- and fourth-grade levels, followed by a second stage adding 6.35 periods to reach fifth- and sixth-grade levels."

Longer school hours offer false fix for care gap, unions warn

Teachers' groups fiercely opposed the proposal. The Korean Federation of Teachers' Unions issued a statement condemning the plan as a "trick" to shift the burden of after-school care onto regular instruction. Meanwhile, the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union held protests at the National Assembly's main gate.

Kim Seon, a teacher at Dunjeon Elementary School in Gyeonggi Province and vice president of the Korea Federation of Teachers' Associations, questioned the pedagogical value of the extra hours.

"Frontline teachers report first-graders already struggle to sit through five periods a day," she said. "First-graders are still developing basic skills like maintaining concentration, regulating emotions, resolving peer conflicts and managing their belongings."

Kim urged policymakers to prioritize quality improvements over longer hours. She called for reducing class sizes, assigning co-teachers during the initial transition period, securing dedicated play spaces and improving the professional accountability of Neulbom School before demanding more time at a desk.

Park So-yeong, a teacher at Daejeon Baeul Elementary School and policy director of the Korean Federation of Teachers' Unions, argued the OECD comparison is structurally flawed. She pointed out that countries with shorter instruction hours, such as Finland and Sweden at 564 to 709 hours, are excluded from the elementary average because their 6-year-olds remain in preschool systems, thereby inflating the overall OECD figure.

Park warned that extending the school day offers a false solution for working families.

"Even if students are dismissed at 3 or 4 p.m., dual-income parents do not return home until 6 or 7 p.m., leaving a massive two- to three-hour gap in after-school care," she said. "The policy merely pushes the start of the daily after-school tutoring cycle from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m."

This article from the Hankook Ilbo, the sister publication of The Korea Times, is translated by a generative AI system and edited by The Korea Times.