Killer Question Highlighted by Foreign Media: "Students Attending Expensive Hagwons Have an Advantage"

Foreign media highlighted South Korea's college entrance exam issues. Controversy continues over the so-called 'killer questions' in the Korean College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT, known as Suneung).

Killer questions refer to ultra-difficult problems that are complexly designed outside the standard public education curriculum.

On the 1st, students are waiting for the start of the 2024 College Scholastic Ability Test June mock exam at Yeouido Girls' High School in Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul.
[Photo by Yonhap News]

On the 20th (local time), Bloomberg News reported that the People Power Party and the government decided the previous day to exclude killer questions from the CSAT. It also noted that about 350,000 high school students in South Korea take the CSAT annually, which corresponds to the U.S. SAT.

Regarding killer questions, Bloomberg stated, "They favor those who can afford expensive private academies due to their affluent family backgrounds." It added, "While educational inequality is a global issue, it is especially severe in South Korea, where admission to prestigious universities is a means to secure jobs at a few large corporations."

It further reported, "Many South Korean high school students take intensive classes in at least three subjects such as Korean, English, and Mathematics at private academies outside of regular full-time schooling."

Bloomberg also said, "Students flocked to private academies to prepare for killer questions, but the high tuition fees drew criticism from the National Assembly and teacher organizations," and "some academies are opposing the government's directive to exclude killer questions, claiming it will only cause confusion for students taking the CSAT at the end of this year."

It continued, "From parents' perspective, there are often no other options but to use private academies to help their children achieve good CSAT scores. As a result, last year, the total private education expenses for elementary, middle, and high school students in South Korea rose about 11% year-on-year to approximately 26 trillion won."

[Photo by Yonhap News]

According to Statistics Korea data, the total private education expenses nationwide for elementary, middle, and high school students reached 26 trillion won last year, up 10.8% from the previous year. This broke the previous record of 23.4 trillion won set in 2021, marking the highest level for two consecutive years.

Notably, the growth rate of private education expenses was twice the inflation rate. Last year, the consumer price inflation rate was 5.1%, the highest in 24 years since the 1998 financial crisis (7.5%), but the increase in private education expenses was twice as high.

The day before, the ruling party and government agreed that while killer questions are an easy way to increase test discrimination, they are the fundamental cause pushing students toward private education. To ensure a 'fair CSAT,' they decided not to include content not covered in the public education curriculum.

President Yoon has repeatedly instructed since March to exclude such questions, but when killer questions appeared again in the June mock exam held on the 1st, he publicly criticized the education authorities.

On the same day, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Education Lee Ju-ho stated, "Killer questions are the fundamental cause driving students to private education," and added, "We will exclude content not covered in the public education curriculum and ensure an appropriate difficulty level."

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