By Lee Hyo-sik
Seven schools from the U.S., Britain and other countries have expressed interests in establishing and operating a foreign school to be set up in Gaepo-dong, southern Seoul, in September 2013, Seoul City said Sunday.
The tentatively named Gaepo Foreign School will run kindergarten to high school curricula, and accommodate a total of 800 students.
The candidate schools are Ellesmere College, Manchester Grammar School and Brighton College in Britain, Eaton House in Singapore, The Waterford School in the U.S., Jyvaskyla Lyceum in Finland and Seoul European School.
``We received applications from private school organizations both at home and abroad from June 13 through Aug. 18. After reviewing their business plans, we will select up to five preliminary candidates next month,’’ a city government official said.
The city plans to visit the selected schools to evaluate their management know-how, financial soundness and other assessment criteria before picking up to three preferred bidders in October.
``We will do everything we can to choose the most-qualified school operator. We expect the envisioned foreign school to help improve educational environment for foreign residents in southern Seoul and attract more investments from outside,’’ the official said.
The operator will be required to raise its own funds needed for the construction of the planned school.
It will be required to pay over 100 million won ($93,000) as an annual rental fee in exchange for leasing 16,078 square meters of land for up to 50 years. Currently, three buildings used for the Seoul Japanese school are on the site.
There are now 21 foreign schools in Seoul but 15 are located north of the Han River, with southern Seoul short of foreign schools with large-sized facilities, high-quality curriculum and talented teachers.
In September last year, London-based Dulwich College opened an international school in Banpo-dong, southern Seoul.
New York-based private academy Dwight School is scheduled to open another international school at the Digital Media City (DMC) in Sangam-dong, western Seoul, in September 2012.