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By Kim Jae-heun
The government's fight against sexual violence committed at schools is raising questions over its efficacy, as nearly 100 teachers across the country have been disciplined for the crimes this year.
Following a series of "school #MeToo" incidents last year, the Ministry of Education came up with measures to root out sex crimes at schools including sexual harassment and sexual assault, with few of them taking effect.
One of the first-rate measures driven by the ministry was to establish a reporting center within the government body. However, the ministry did not have any counselors at the center until July this year and it only hired one in a temporary position.
The counselor alone had to manage 116 cases reported to the center between January and November, which was a 15 percent increase from 101 cases reported in the same period the year before. People became concerned that a personnel shortage there led to poor handling of the job.
The number of professional counselors at public schools has increased by 21.7 percent this year to 2,715 from 2,231 in 2018. However, the government said it will only increase 5 percent to hire 2,852 next year.
Considering that there are over 9,000 public schools across the nation, the number of professional counselors still falls short, but the ministry has cut their hiring rate sharp just in one year.
Moreover, the government has also failed to keep its promise that it will make it a prerequisite for local education offices to establish committees investigating sex-related crimes at schools.
Only seven out of 17 local education offices including those of Seoul, Daegu, Incheon and Gyeonggi Province have formed the responsible department.
The Daejeon Metropolitan Office of Education and the education office in North Gyeongsang Province have confirmed their plans to establish investigating committees in 2020, but the other eight will not have their own teams next year.
There is a statute revision that the ministry has promised to push but did not pass the National Assembly and will become abolished along with the end of the 20th Assembly's term next year.
The government body has planned to expand the participation of women and students from outside in the disciplinary committee punishing school faculty at private schools, but it failed to pass the standing committee reviewing the bill.
Choi Yoo-kyung, the co-founder of teenager feminist network "WeTee," said the government's preventive education programs on sexual harassment lack effectiveness and are causing secondary damage from sex crimes and spurring hatred for women in schools.
"The ministry said it has reinforced preventive measures for school faculties related to sex crimes but they are only educational programs to watch online, which we believe have a small effect," Choi said.
Meanwhile, nearly 400 teachers have been fired in the last five years for committing sex crimes against their students. The number who have been punished for related crimes reached 686, according to Rep. Yeo Young-kug of the minor opposition Justice Party, who belongs to the Education Committee at the National Assembly.
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