Students and Staff COVID-19 Cases at Year's End 30 Times Higher, Schools on Alert for Class Disruptions

Average of 29,100 Students Confirmed Daily Since School Reopening
Surge in Teacher Infections Causes Difficulty Securing Substitute Staff

As the spread of the COVID-19 Omicron variant continues, on the 2nd, when elementary, middle, and high schools reopened, parents at Geumyang Elementary School in Yongsan-gu, Seoul, watched their children moving to classrooms. Photo by Kang Jin-hyung aymsdream@

[Asia Economy Reporter Han Jinju] Since the start of the new semester, the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases among students and school staff nationwide has increased 30-fold compared to the end of last year, leading to a surge in schools switching from full in-person classes to remote learning. As teachers have also been confirmed positive one after another, some are conducting remote classes while undergoing home treatment due to the inability to find substitute teachers.

According to the Ministry of Education, the average daily number of confirmed COVID-19 cases among kindergarten, elementary, middle, and high school students during the six days after the new semester started (March 2?7) was 29,100. This is 30 times higher than the daily average of confirmed cases (963.1) during the largest scale in the second semester last year, December 9?15.

Along with the nationwide surge in confirmed cases, the number of infected school staff has also increased sharply. The average daily number of confirmed school staff cases over six days was 2,409.2, which is 30 times more than the 80.7 cases recorded from December 16?22 last year.

Schools are facing difficulties as they cannot immediately deploy substitute teachers to cover classes. According to the Korean Teachers and Education Workers Union (Jeon-gyo-jo), last week at a middle school, six teachers who were confirmed positive or quarantined conducted remote classes after being unable to attend school.

Although the Ministry of Education has proposed measures to secure substitute personnel, it is insufficient to replace infected teachers, and there is a significant imbalance in supply and demand by region. Previously, the Ministry announced that it had hired 8,900 temporary teachers for overcrowded schools and classes and operates a substitute teacher pool of 75,000, including retired teachers, waiting appointees, and instructors.

An official from the Ministry of Education said, "There are problems securing personnel due to supply-demand imbalances between residential and work areas," adding, "Some education support offices directly assign substitutes, and in some metropolitan areas like Gyeonggi Province, efforts are underway to assign an additional 4,639 teachers beyond the regular quota."

The Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education also proposed solutions to ease the shortage of substitute teachers by relaxing hiring conditions for contract teachers and allowing teachers on leave or secondment to participate as substitutes. Each of the 11 education support offices is recruiting a pool of part-time instructors responsible for covering classes.

A representative from the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education said, "While the education office is considering hiring substitute teachers, the demand for personnel in Seoul is very high, and education support offices are skeptical about efficiency, but there are significant difficulties in hiring substitutes on the ground," adding, "We will consider expanding the pool and allowing education support offices to mainly recruit substitutes."

As the number of confirmed cases continues to surge daily since the start of the semester, the number of students switching to remote classes or unable to attend school is also increasing.

As of the 7th, 88.1% (17,894 schools) conducted full in-person classes. Schools that held some remote classes accounted for 9.6% (1,955 schools), full remote classes were 1.8% (334 schools), and discretionary holidays were 0.6% (128 schools). Compared to the first day of the new semester on the 2nd, the number of schools conducting full in-person classes decreased by 325 schools (1.6 percentage points) on the 7th.

The number of students unable to attend in-person classes due to infection or quarantine also increased. On the 2nd, 5.19 million students (88.1%) attended school, but on the 7th, this dropped to 4.82 million (81.9%), a decrease of 370,000 students (6.2 percentage points). On the 7th, kindergarten students had the lowest attendance rate (77.8%), followed by elementary students (81.3%), middle school students (81.8%), and high school students (85.2%).

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