The Disappearance of 'Killer Questions' in the CSAT... Students and Parents Ask, "Why Now?"

Concerns Over Easy CSAT Raise Focus on Securing Differentiation

The government’s announcement to exclude ‘killer questions’ (ultra-high difficulty questions) from the 2024 College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) has caused growing confusion among examinees and parents preparing for the exam. This is because it has become even more difficult to predict the question trends and difficulty levels of the mock test scheduled for September 6 and the CSAT on November 16.

On the 19th, educational content is displayed in front of an academy in Daechi-dong, Gangnam-gu, Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News

On the 19th, the ruling party and the government held a 'Party-Government Council on Enhancing School Education Competitiveness and Reducing Private Education' at the National Assembly, agreeing that while ‘killer questions’ are an easy way to increase test discrimination, they are the fundamental cause driving students to private education. They decided to exclude questions that cover content not taught in the public education curriculum in order to ensure a ‘fair CSAT.’

◆ Aftermath of President Yoon’s Remarks... Dismissal of Director-General and Resignation of Evaluation Institute President = President Yoon Suk-yeol criticized the killer questions, which are complicatedly set outside the public education curriculum, on the 15th, calling them “an inappropriate and unfair act targeting hundreds of thousands of students” and “playing with our vulnerable children.” President Yoon had repeatedly instructed since March to exclude such questions, but controversy arose again when killer questions appeared in the June mock test (mock evaluation).

On the following day, the 16th, Lee Yun-hong, the Director of Talent Policy Planning at the Ministry of Education responsible for university admissions, was dismissed citing failure to adjust the difficulty of the June mock evaluation. Subsequently, on the 19th, Lee Kyu-min, President of the Korea Institute for Curriculum and Evaluation, announced his intention to step down. Two officials resigned within four days after President Yoon’s directive to exclude CSAT questions outside the public education curriculum. The Ministry of Education also announced a large-scale audit of the Evaluation Institute for the first time in 12 years, citing controversy over CSAT questions beyond the curriculum.

◆ Securing Discrimination Power Amid Concerns of an Easy CSAT = As the government repeatedly emphasizes the policy to exclude killer questions outside the curriculum, attention is focused on the question types for this year’s CSAT. It is expected that question types such as ‘Korean non-literary questions requiring excessive background knowledge or university major-level knowledge’ and ‘subject-integrated problems that cannot be taught in schools’ will disappear.

However, the problem is that these question types were only examples given by President Yoon, and there are no related laws or regulations defining ‘killer questions.’ Students and teachers have simply referred to high-difficulty questions as ‘killer questions’ in common parlance.

Ultimately, it is widely expected that this year’s CSAT will mostly consist of semi-killer questions instead of the killer questions mentioned by President Yoon. Lee Ju-ho, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education, said at a working-level party-government meeting with People Power Party lawmakers on the 29th, “If good evaluators create good questions, securing discrimination power is fully possible.”

◆ Examinees and Parents: “Why at This Particular Time?” = Examinees are confused by the news that the CSAT policy will change after the June mock evaluation has already been conducted. Since the CSAT is only five months away, it is difficult to respond to significant changes in question types or difficulty levels. Many express bewilderment at the government’s sudden announcement of changes.

Kang Mi-ja (49), who has a high school senior child, said, “I don’t understand why they are making this announcement at this time,” adding, “My child is upset because they have to reorganize their study plan based on a vague CSAT direction.” Examinee Kim Da-som (17) said, “I was studying according to the question formats of the June and September mock tests and organizing my error notes, but I’m confused because they suddenly said the question types might change,” adding, “The academy only says they are still figuring out the exact question direction, so I feel helpless.”

Experts in the admissions industry also point out that the timing of this announcement, which could lead to a CSAT reform, is inappropriate. Lim Sung-ho, CEO of Jongro Academy, said, “It would have been better if the direction was presented at the start of the semester in March or if such instructions were given after reviewing the results right after the CSAT and judging that there was a problem,” adding, “Students should not pre-judge whether this year’s CSAT will be easy or difficult but should focus on their textbooks.”

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