More teachers buy insurance to defend rights

By Bahk Eun-ji

A growing number of teachers are purchasing insurance policies in preparation for possible conflicts with students or their parents as more and more of them face physical or verbal violence at schools, data from the Korea Federation of Teachers' Associations (KFTA) revealed Monday.

According to the data, 501 cases of infringements of teacher's rights were reported in 2018, more than double the number in 2010 when only 200 cases were reported.

In line with the increasing number of cases of teachers' authority being infringed on, more are purchasing insurance policies to protect themselves.

The-K Non-Life Insurance, owned by the Korea Teachers Credit Union (KTCU), launched the insurance program covering damage to teachers' authority in 2017.

The policy covers the cost of a lawyer when there is a civil suit. Also, when a school association confirms that a teacher's authority has been damaged, the teacher can receive up to 3 million won ($2,566) in compensation.

Since the company launched the policy in 2017, the number of subscribers increased to 4,088 as of September 2019, from 1,563 in 2018.

Cho also said many cases reported to the association turned out to be related to parents, not students.

“Many teachers who contacted us about authority infringement cases were related not only to a civil trial but also criminal ones. Most parents filed a suit over child abuse by teachers,” KFTA spokesman Cho Sung-chul said.

Data from the Ministry of Education, submitted to Rep. Park Kyung-mi of the ruling Democratic Party of Korea, shows 210 cases of parents damaging teachers' authority were reported in 2018, a 3.3-fold increase from 63 in 2014.

“Teachers seeking help from us mainly complained of the difficulties with parents who usually file a criminal complaint,” Cho said.

He said even though 17 regional educational offices nationwide had long offered their teachers an insurance program to cover the cost of litigation, it only covers part of civil cases under limited conditions.

“Teachers said they don't think the insurance coverage from education offices is enough, so they are looking for private insurance programs like the one from The-K Non-Life Insurance,” Cho said.

The spokesman said some teachers involved in conflicts with parents or students were reluctant to talk about their cases openly especially with the education authorities, adding that the latter should come up with a practical plan to provide tangible help.

Ko Sun-young, 33, a middle school teacher in Suwon, Gyeonggi Province, said she recently subscribed to the insurance although she has not experienced any such problems.

“I haven't been involved in any conflict with students or their parents yet,” she said. “But I have heard about many such incidents and decided to purchase an insurance policy just in case.”