Seoul-Style Educational Welfare Schools Expanded to 1,272 Locations in 2023

198 More Schools Compared to Last Year
All High Schools Designated as General Schools

[Asia Economy Reporter Yoo Byung-don] Support for the integrated growth of students from low-income families in need of assistance will be expanded.

On the 28th, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education announced that it has designated a total of 1,272 schools as "2023 Seoul-type Educational Welfare Schools" by expanding the program.

The Seoul-type Educational Welfare School support project designates schools with students from low-income families and provides specialized educational welfare personnel and budgets. It offers integrated educational opportunities to help target students overcome educational deprivation and achieve holistic growth. The budget for next year is 17.21062 billion KRW, and the number of target students is 49,527.

Seoul-type Educational Welfare Schools are divided into "Hub Schools," which have a large number of students receiving concentrated support and receive specialized personnel and operational budgets, and "General Schools," which receive a budget per student and operate programs in connection with regional educational welfare centers. Next year, a total of 1,272 schools (operating rate 96.4%) will be designated and operated as project schools. This is an increase of 198 schools compared to the previous year.

As the importance of support for educationally vulnerable students, which has increased due to COVID-19 and other factors, has grown, there has been a high demand from schools for the expansion of hub schools and the increase of specialized educational welfare personnel. Accordingly, in 2023, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education plans to increase the number of hub schools by 10, deploy specialized educational welfare personnel, reduce the workload of schools with a high concentration of educationally vulnerable students, and strengthen customized support for students receiving concentrated support.

In addition, following the designation and expansion of all elementary and middle schools as general schools in 2022, from 2023, all high schools will be designated as general schools, establishing a seamless educational welfare safety net across elementary, middle, and high schools.

Cho Hee-yeon, Superintendent of the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, stated, "The Educational Welfare School project is the cornerstone for building the Seoul educational welfare safety net," and explained, "Through the expansion of Seoul-type Educational Welfare Schools in 2023, we will provide closer support to educationally vulnerable students at schools, which are the places most closely connected to students."

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