Jongno-gu Provides Laptops for Online Learning to Educationally Disadvantaged Students

Providing Laptops to About 1,000 Low-Income Elementary, Middle, and High School Students to Address Educational Blind Spots Due to Online Classes

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Jong-il] As COVID-19 continues for a long time and school classes are conducted online, measures are needed to support low-income families without learning devices.

Accordingly, Jongno-gu (Mayor Kim Young-jong) will provide online learning devices to low-income students in the area to guarantee the right to education for educationally vulnerable students and to eliminate educational blind spots.

The support targets low-income families in the district, including basic livelihood security recipients, low-income single-parent families, and near-poverty groups, covering a total of 1,040 students: 207 elementary school students, 153 middle school students, and 680 high school students.

Jongno-gu’s support for online learning devices for educationally vulnerable students follows the results of an emergency agenda meeting held on April 1 by the Seoul Metropolitan Council of District Mayors. On that day, the council decided that Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, and autonomous districts would share the budget in a 4:4:2 ratio to provide online learning devices to educationally vulnerable students through schools.

The district will cover about 140 million won, which corresponds to 20% of the autonomous district’s share, from the disaster management fund, and will provide laptops to about 1,000 students in the area.

Kim Young-jong, Mayor of Jongno-gu, said, “With the prolonged COVID-19 situation, online classes are being conducted for the first time in history, and students from low-income families without learning devices must have found it difficult to participate in classes. We hope that this support for online learning devices will allow all students to attend classes equally and alleviate some of their inconveniences.”

Jongno-gu urgently allocated an additional budget of 3.3 billion won to recover the local economy, which has been stagnated due to COVID-19, and to support residents facing economic difficulties.

The additional budget details include ▲1 billion won for creating emergency public jobs ▲560 million won from the disaster management fund for quarantine activities and protection of vulnerable groups ▲1 billion won from the Small and Medium Business Development Fund to support loans for small business owners ▲870 million won in reserve funds to actively respond to unpredictable variables such as the district’s share of government support policies announced one after another.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.