By Kim Tae-jong
BUSAN ― The top educator in this southeastern port city said the recent drive to strengthen students’ human rights at all schools across the nations should not result in the infringement on teachers’ authority.
Under new ordinances, primary and secondary schools have banned teachers from using corporal punishment in classrooms. Some liberal municipal and provincial top educators are even banning indirect physical punishment such as push-ups and standing at the back of the class.
However, Lim Hea-kyung, superintendent of the Busan Metropolitan City Office of Education, expressed concerns over the weakening of the authority of teachers, which she said would in turn weaken the quality of public education.
“I think teachers should be given greater authority. It is essential for better public education,” she said. “Too severe restrictions on teachers’ rights in classrooms can have negative impact on teaching.”
Lim said the protection of teachers’ authority was a very important element to boost the quality of public education.
“We need to give each school greater autonomy in disciplining students in the wake of the ban on corporal punishment. Effective disciplinary rules should be applied to check unruly students for the protection of other students’ rights to study,” she said.
Lim emphasized all educational policies should focus on the needs of students and parents, and not be politically-oriented.
“I think we need to first think of what parents and students want, and if they make a reasonable request, we need to try to seek a way to meet it. In this regard, the issue of students’ welfare including free lunches at school shouldn’t be used by political populists,” she said.
Students’ welfare is undoubtedly one of the most important educational policies but the approach to it should reflect the reality, including school budgets.
Lim was the first superintendent to offer free lunches to first graders at elementary schools, and plans to gradually expand the benefit to higher graders.
“I think schools need to provide free meal programs step by step after securing sufficient funding,” she said.
The top educator in the nation’s largest port city said native English teachers were making a substantial contribution to boosting English education.
In Busan, about 520 native English teachers are currently working at primary and secondary schools.
Lim said schools need to establish an environment to more actively engage in teaching. Currently, native English speaking teachers are contracted to work as an “assistant” teacher and are always accompanied by a Korean teacher.
She believes schools also need to improve working conditions for native English teachers, and allow them to actively engage in teaching activities at a similar level allowed to Korean teachers as long as they have experience in teaching and the capability to lead a class on their own.
“Such measures will help native English teachers take more responsibility for classes and students, which consequently can help enhance the quality of English classes and keep skillful and qualified teachers from leaving schools,” she said.
The plan is in line with her philosophy that emphasizes a more practical approach to education, which she has maintained since her inauguration last year.
“The problem is current education largely focuses on helping students get higher scores in tests. But I think schools need to offer students chances to receive quality education first,” she said.
As an example, Lim believes schools should help students get exposed to more English environments to practice and improve their English, instead of receiving a test-focused education.
“I think English newspapers in education are one of the great ideas to help students learn English,” she said. “They can learn useful words and expressions in circumstances more directly related to their life.”
She also strongly believes students need to play a leading role in deciding what and how to study, and how to organize their time for that. Such belief led her to introduce the “study planner program” for all the students in Busan.
“By writing a study planner or diary, students can independently organize their time and decide what to do,” she said.
Looking back over the past year, Lim, who celebrated her first anniversary on the job on July 1, said things were not as easy as she first thought. As the first elected female superintendent in history, she felt much pressure on her shoulders.
But Lim said she simply tried to think why comparatively conservative Busan citizens elected her as the superintendent of education to decide what she should do.
“I figured out that people wanted me to take a feminine approach to education, namely a more delicate and considerate stance to reflect their needs in educational policies,” she said.
In the latter part of her tenure, she pledged to make efforts to strengthen the quality of public education, so that students do not need to go to “hagwon,” or private cram schools, and especially to come up with measures to embrace students from low-income families.