KDI "Expand Information on Graduate Salaries... Need to Ease University Enrollment Regulations"

As universities face a crisis due to the declining school-age population, there are criticisms that the structural reforms linked to university evaluations and financial support implemented by the Ministry of Education have limitations. This approach by the Ministry is unlikely to be free from political considerations and may further infringe on university autonomy and creativity while increasing dependence on the government. The Korea Development Institute (KDI) suggested that it is necessary to significantly expand the provision of information on individual universities and departments, such as disclosing graduates' salaries, to establish a system where demand preferences can be more actively reflected.

On the 20th, KDI released a report titled "KDI Focus: Demand-Centered University Structural Reform" containing these findings. According to the report, the number of enrolled students at four-year general universities has been declining since 2014 due to the decrease in the school-age population, and it is expected to drop to between 690,000 and 830,000 by 2045, about half of the current number.

Starting with the Kim Dae-jung administration, the previous government undertook structural adjustments focusing on lower-tier universities in 2018 and 2021, imposing enrollment quota adjustments and reductions at the university level rather than by individual departments. The problem is that the Ministry of Education’s method of demanding enrollment reductions linked to university evaluations and financial support is not free from political considerations. For example, under the Moon Jae-in administration, the number of universities subject to enrollment reductions was significantly reduced due to considerations of national balanced development. The government-led judgment on which majors should increase also risks distorting labor supply.

[Image source=Yonhap News]

Professors’ opposition is also an obstacle to university structural reform. When asked whether enrollment adjustments within universities occur according to demand, 25% of professors responded that they do not. This rate was particularly high in national universities (50% in metropolitan areas, 35% in non-metropolitan areas). Despite the rapid decline in student numbers at non-metropolitan national universities, they are lukewarm about structural reform. KDI analyzed that national universities have less incentive for structural reform because the government guarantees their budget and employment of faculty and staff.

KDI emphasized that university structural reform should be carried out so that students, who bear the ultimate responsibility for evaluating universities, can easily access important information. To encourage this, it is necessary to greatly expand the provision of information on individual universities and departments. For example, information on salaries should be provided, and employment rates should be offered not only for one year after graduation but for as many periods as possible. Alongside salaries and employment rates, various information reflecting university performance, such as professors’ research achievements and industry-academia cooperation results, should also be provided.

Furthermore, it was pointed out that measures to relax or abolish regulations on tuition fees and metropolitan area enrollment quotas should also be considered. This is because tuition fee regulations hinder competitive universities from securing sufficient resources to widen the competitiveness gap with other universities. KDI believes that easing tuition fee regulations could promote structural reform centered on competitive universities.

KDI also recommended that separate structural reforms should be implemented for national universities. Due to the nature of the public sector, national universities are likely to continue existing even if they do not attract student choices. The employment rate of non-metropolitan national universities is about 7.6 percentage points lower than that of metropolitan private universities, and although their department sizes are small, they have the largest school size by student enrollment and the highest number of departments. KDI Senior Research Fellow Ko Young-sun stated, "It is necessary to take measures such as increasing tuition fees, reducing government support, and expanding scholarship support for low-income students."

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