"Income Unchanged but National Scholarship Rejected"... 70,000 Fewer Recipients Last Year

740,000 Type I Beneficiaries Last Year
Official Prices Rose 4-5% in Past Years... 19% Surge in 2021
Scholarship Loss Despite No Change in Household Income Levels

The number of students receiving national scholarships decreased by about 70,000 last year. It appears that some students, whose income remained the same, were unable to receive national scholarships because the income conversion amount increased significantly due to the sharp rise in real estate official prices.

According to data received from the Ministry of Education by Rep. Lee Eun-ju of the Justice Party on the 10th, the number of recipients of the National Scholarship Type I last year was 740,154, a decrease of 66,949 (8.3%) from the previous year (807,103).

Seoul National University view.
Photo by Yonhap News

National Scholarship Type I is a scholarship awarded to university students enrolled in domestic universities who meet academic standards. It is linked to income level, so the lower the monthly income standard amount calculated from household income and assets, the more scholarship support a student can receive. Only those in income brackets 8 or below are eligible, while those in brackets 9 to 10 are not supported.

As the number of national scholarship recipients decreased, only 3.8099 trillion won out of the 4.1348 trillion won budget for national scholarships was spent last year. The unused budget, caused by not being able to use the allocated funds, amounted to 294.962 billion won.

The Ministry of Education and the Korea Student Aid Foundation explained that the decrease in the number of national scholarship recipients and the resulting increase in unused funds were due to a reduction in students passing the academic criteria.

To receive National Scholarship Type I, students must meet not only the income criteria but also the academic standard of having a GPA of B or higher in the previous semester. The percentage of students with a B grade or higher declined continuously from 84.6% in the first semester of 2021 to 83.7% in the second semester, and 79.9% in the first semester of 2022.

The Ministry of Education and the Scholarship Foundation also analyzed that the sharp rise in the previous year's real estate official prices, which affects scholarship eligibility, had an impact.

In 2021, real estate official prices rose by 19.05% compared to the previous year, marking the largest increase since 2007 (22.7%).

However, regarding this, the National Assembly pointed out, "The Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announces real estate official prices every year between March and April, and by the time the government prepared the 2022 budget (in August), the 2021 official prices had already been announced," adding, "The rise in real estate official prices could have been sufficiently reflected when preparing the budget." They further demanded, "Institutional improvements are needed to establish a student loan support bracket calculation method that can buffer the sharp fluctuations in official prices of multi-family housing so that university students can receive national scholarships stably."

Song Kyung-won, policy committee member of the Justice Party, explained, "This means that although household income has not changed, some students lost eligibility for national scholarships due to the rise in apartment prices," and added, "Since there have been demands for system improvements, it is expected that the Ministry of Education will devise measures."

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