Ministry of Education to Operate 96 Pilot Schools for Tailored Support of High-Risk Students

19 Sites Designated as Pilot Education Support Offices

The Ministry of Education announced on the 6th that it will operate 19 pilot education support offices and 96 leading schools to address the complex difficulties faced by students.

This measure was prepared as a follow-up to the "Plan to Establish a Student-Customized Integrated Support System" announced by the Ministry of Education in December last year to realize the national task of "strengthening the national education responsibility system to eliminate educational disparities." Student-customized integrated support is a system that provides personalized support for each student from the identification, application, reception, diagnosis, support, to management of students in crisis.

The existing educational welfare support was operated independently by individual projects or policies, making it difficult for schools or education offices to comprehensively understand student issues or provide customized support, and it was also challenging to cooperate with local governments or private organizations.

In January and February, the Ministry of Education conducted training to strengthen the capacity for student-centered integrated support, including problem-solving case experiences and sharing of excellent student-centered integrated support cases, targeting superintendents, department heads, and staff of education support offices wishing to operate pilot education support offices, as well as principals, vice principals, responsible teachers, and educational welfare officers of 2023 leading schools.

When schools request support for high-risk students facing complex difficulties such as economic hardship, basic academic underachievement, psychological and emotional crises, child abuse, or school violence, the pilot education support offices provide customized support to the students through internal and external cooperation systems. They also support schools in developing early detection and prevention-oriented student support capabilities.

At leading schools, school members carefully observe students in daily life to identify those in need of help early and provide necessary customized support to the students through the "Student-Customized Integrated Support Team (tentative name)."

After designation, pilot education support offices and leading schools will build a student-customized integrated support system reflecting the status of students and local conditions of each institution through support from a professional consulting group for three years. Furthermore, various operational models with high field applicability and acceptance developed through this process will be promoted to spread throughout the educational field.

Jang Sang-yoon, Vice Minister of Education, stated, "All students should be able to receive education at school with peace of mind," adding, "We plan to establish legal grounds to enable integrated support by linking all resources of schools, teachers, and local communities in the future."

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