Board of Audit and Inspection: "56 Current Teachers Investigated for Accepting Money from Private Education Companies and Trading Exam Questions"

"Inspection of Service Status Related to Participation in Private Education Market"
Request for Investigation on Violations of the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act and Obstruction of Business Charges

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An audit by the Board of Audit and Inspection revealed that allegations of a 'private education cartel,' where active teachers colluded with private education companies to provide mock exam questions in exchange for money, were true.

On the 11th, the Board of Audit and Inspection announced that the results of the audit conducted from September to December last year on 'the participation of teachers in the private education market and related work conduct' confirmed that there was a transaction of questions mediated by the exchange of money between private education companies seeking questions aligned with the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) trends and some teachers seeking financial gain.

The Board requested the National Police Agency to investigate 56 individuals, including teachers and academy officials found to be involved, on charges of violating the Improper Solicitation and Graft Act, obstruction of business, breach of trust, and bribery.

The investigation request also included those involved in the controversy over question 23 of the 2023 CSAT English exam.

According to the Board, Professor A, commissioned by the Korea Institute for Curriculum and Evaluation (KICE), reviewed the EBS CSAT-linked textbook published in August 2022, scheduled for release in January 2023. The textbook included a question created by a high school teacher in March 2022 based on a passage titled "Too Much Information" (TMI). Professor A became aware of the TMI passage while reviewing the EBS textbook in August 2022 and later, as a CSAT English question setter for the 2023 exam, used the TMI passage without permission to create question 23 on the CSAT.

Famous instructor B, who regularly purchased questions from teachers to create mock exams, was found to have received questions based on the TMI passage through another teacher C, who was acquainted with the original creator of the TMI passage, and published them as a mock exam at the end of September.

The Board reported that 215 objections were filed claiming that the same passage used in the 'top instructor’s mock exam questions' appeared on the CSAT.

Additionally, the English team at KICE failed to properly cross-check private mock exams before finalizing the CSAT questions, allowing the TMI passage questions to be duplicated on the CSAT.

The audit also confirmed that a question supply organization was formed by recruiting other CSAT review committee members by a teacher with experience as a CSAT review committee member. This organization traded questions with private education companies, and some teachers concealed their transaction history with these companies while participating as CSAT question setters.

High school teacher D, who participated in multiple CSAT and mock exam review committees, recruited a total of eight teachers with review and question-setting experience during CSAT and mock exam question-setting retreats. From 2019 to May 2023, they produced and supplied about 2,000 questions and received 660 million KRW in payments.

The Board explained that 390 million KRW was paid to participating teachers, while the remaining 270 million KRW was received by teacher D as question production fees and brokerage fees.

Another high school teacher E, who co-managed a publishing company established by their spouse, formed a question production team of 35 active teachers and transferred questions to private education companies and famous academy instructors, earning several hundred million KRW in illicit profits.

High school teacher F was found to have received 180 million KRW from 2019 to 2022 for producing and supplying over 1,200 mock exam questions and supplementary materials for academy lectures to private education companies. High school teacher G produced and supplied over 7,000 predicted questions for school exams to an online private education company from 2018 to September 2023 and received 83 million KRW in return.

In addition, a current admissions officer was caught taking money after providing self-introduction letter writing lectures while employed at a private education company.

The Board stated, "Many cases were confirmed where the Higher Education Act’s provision restricting employment at academies for three years after retirement as an admissions officer was violated." It added, "Since there are no legal sanctions for violations, we will take measures such as system improvements through the Ministry of Education after a resolution by the Audit Committee." Furthermore, "For many teachers confirmed to have received money through question transactions, we plan to take strict responsibility and measures after a resolution by the Audit Committee."

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