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A Study of alternative education in Korea

To meet the global and informational 21st century, numerous countries around the world, including Korea, have begun to reform their own educational systems. However, the experience of their reforms did not solve the problems of traditional education but rather have made the problems worse. In the early 1990s, thousands of students committed suicide, and tens of thousands of students dropped out from schools or could not adapt themselves to the schools in Korea. In order to solve the problem, the government and people from all classes started to promote the idea of alternative education enthusiastically.
The first alternative school in Korea was established in March of 1997, and the number of alternative schools had amounted to about 80 in 2005. Although most alternative schools did not get the recognition from the education authorities because they didn¡¦t conform to the education legislations and regulations, and thus making them lack of financial support, the number of alternative schools still kept rising due to the efforts of the religious groups, the societal communities and parents. By analyzing the backgrounds such as philosophies, humanities, politics, economy, history and geography of Korea, the researcher try to realize why the alternative education quickly developed in Korea these past years.
The conclusions of the research are as follows:
I.As policies changed, traditional education can¡¦t help but ignore the expectations of the minority. The minority then turned to seek new methods, and alternative education constantly developed under the situation.
II.Before the development of alternative education, the masses of every field were awakened by this social revolutions. Hence, they could be the main force to develop alternative education.
III.In Korea, alternative schools began in senior high school, and most of them were authorized by the education bureaucracies. But most alternative schools at junior high and elementary education levels were not authorized because of the compulsory education statue.
IV.Unlike the other education revolutions, the alternative education movement was actively participated by various kinds of groups.
V.Without adequate preparation, many alternative schools were established too hastily in a short time. In addition, the society and educators didn¡¦t have enough time to gain the correct knowledge about alternative education, and thus have encountered quite a few difficulties which need to be solved.
VI.The development of alternative education in Korea is deeply concerned with its history, geography, politics, economy, philosophy and humanities roots.
According to the above conclusions, the researcher proposes some suggestions with the consideration of Korean culture:
I.Suggestions for alternative schools
A.To try to find workable strategies, and ask the government for more practical help.
B.To improve the working conditions and environment of the teachers.
C.To get involved in the activities in the neighborhood or in the society, and to make the activities successful.
II.Suggestions for the government
A.To enforce the compulsory education legislation flexibly and to respect the right of school choice in the part of parents.
B.To actively support alternative schools.
C.To lessen and simplify the sophistication of regulations at school administration procedures.
D.To provide some measures to train the teachers of alternative schools.
III.Suggestions for the teachers of traditional education
A.To identify oneself as the subject of education activity itself.
B.To actively explore alternative education and apply the workable part of it to the traditional education.
IV.Suggestions for further research
A.To do a thorough research on alternative education of Taiwan.
B.To locate some possible ways to apply several aspects of Korean alternative schools to education in Taiwan.
Keywords: Korean education, alternative education, alternative schools.

Identiferoai:union.ndltd.org:NSYSU/oai:NSYSU:etd-0913106-162210
Date13 September 2006
CreatorsJo, Jae-young
ContributorsCai-Yin Wang, Ching-Hwa Tsai, Yi-Hsing Chung
PublisherNSYSU
Source SetsNSYSU Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Archive
LanguageCholon
Detected LanguageEnglish
Typetext
Formatapplication/pdf
Sourcehttp://etd.lib.nsysu.edu.tw/ETD-db/ETD-search/view_etd?URN=etd-0913106-162210
Rightsunrestricted, Copyright information available at source archive

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