The Written Exam for This Year's National Civil Service Grade 7 Open Recruitment Ends... What Were the Attendance Rate and Difficulty Level?

On the morning of July 11, a test taker is checking the examination room at the Grade 9 National Civil Service Written Examination site set up at a middle school in Seo-gu, Gwangju. [Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Choi Eun-young] The attendance rate for the national civil service Grade 7 open competitive written exam held on the 26th declined compared to last year. It is analyzed that social confusion caused by COVID-19 and the resulting postponement of the exam influenced this outcome.

The Ministry of Personnel Management announced on the 26th that out of a total of 34,703 applicants for the national Grade 7 open competitive written exam conducted across 17 cities and provinces nationwide, 23,217 took the exam. This represents an attendance rate of 66.9%, which is 4.7 percentage points lower than last year's 71.6%.

This written exam was originally scheduled for the 22nd of last month but was postponed by about a month to the 26th to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

The attendance rate for this year's civil service exams is generally lower than last year.

In fact, the national Grade 9 open competitive written exam held on July 11 recorded an attendance rate of 70.5%, down 8.5 percentage points from last year's 79.0%. Earlier, the national Grade 5 open competitive and diplomatic candidate first exams held on May 16 had an attendance rate of 77.0%, showing a 5.2% decline from last year's 82.2%.

Both exams were also postponed and conducted about three months later than originally scheduled, which is expected to have affected the low attendance rates.

Meanwhile, examinees responded to the national Grade 7 exam held on the 26th with comments such as "It was easy but there was not enough time," "Overall, the questions were ambiguous, so I am not confident about the grading," and "There were several unfamiliar questions."

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