In a country that places great emphasis on education and social advancement, the industry for cram schools, or hagwons, flourish. The Korea Times report that 28,000 cram schools currently exist in South Korea, which incurs over $15 billion in tuition annually. The cram school is a way of increasing a child’s chances at the annual college examinations, where a series of multiple choice questions and fill-in-the-blank questions written by the South Korean government determines the future prospects of a teenager.
South Korean children are prepared at a young age for the standardized examinations to enter the top South Korean universities–Seoul National University, Yonsei University, and Korea University. The government’s top positions reinforce the notion that success is equated with prestigious university enrollment. Top cram schools usually charge $1,000 a month per subject, which, as the Korea Times points out, is a large financial burden on parents who have average incomes of $16,000.
Conditions in Korean cram schools are tough–12-18 hours of daily studying, no Internet, no television, no game machines, and pretty much a suspension of anything that can be seen as potentially distracting to studying. Parents call it an “inevitable choice,” where the one-size-fits-all educational system is often credited as the fuel for the nation’s economic success. Time reports that the South Korean GDP has risen 40,000% since 1962, and its obsession over education has transformed the country into an economic powerhouse.
The Korea Times in 2009 reported that parents are frequently overcharged tuition fees at the hagwon. In a survey conducted by the Ministry of Education, Science, and Technology, 358 cram schools out of a sample of 500 cram schools charge 40% more than the standardized tuition rate. Cram schools will continue to thrive as the nation braces for the 2012 round of national examinations coming up later this month.
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