Fluctuating 'Paid Leave Deadline'... Risk of Collective Paid Leave from at Least July

Medical Student Repetition Scenarios by Academic Operation
Universities Point Out 'Already at Limit'
Flexible Operation Applies Repetition After July
Ministry of Education Mentions 'Up to February Next Year'

As the government finalizes the procedure to increase the number of medical school admissions this week, medical students continue to express their opposition through collective actions such as group leave of absence. Since the mid-May deadline initially set by the government has passed, there are concerns that group failure may be unavoidable as early as July.

Lee Ju-ho, Deputy Prime Minister for Social Affairs and Minister of Education, attended the "Medical School Operating Universities Presidents' Meeting" held on the 20th at the Korea Educational Facilities Safety Institute in Yeongdeungpo-gu, Seoul, and shared opinions with the presidents of universities operating medical schools via video conference. Photo by Kang Jin-hyung aymsdream@

According to university sources on the 28th, universities are applying their own academic management measures to postpone failure as the risk of group failure among medical students approaches. The problem is that the academic management methods are being applied differently across universities. Currently, the Ministry of Education is leaving measures to prevent failure to the autonomy of each university.

In principle, the failure deadline was mid this month. Considering laws such as the Higher Education Act, each university must secure at least 15 weeks of classes per semester, making the deadline between April and May after the semester starts in March. Many universities assign an F grade if a student is absent for more than one-quarter or one-third of the class days. It is customary to fail a student if they receive even one F grade.

Because of this, universities have started the semester to prevent failure, but actual class attendance remains low. They are avoiding the crisis by recognizing attendance through online classes or written attendance, but voices within universities say group failure is inevitable.

Some speculate that the deadline could be from late July to early August. If the failure criteria are temporarily not applied during the first semester, failure can be postponed until the end of June when the semester ends. However, if the existing failure criteria are applied after the second semester begins, it will be difficult to avoid failure as early as July to August, and at the latest by October to November.

At a regular briefing the day before, the Ministry of Education announced that the failure deadline is “February 28 next year,” when this year’s curriculum ends. This is based on the premise that universities apply standards such as changing the curriculum operation basis from semester to academic year. If the class schedule is adjusted within the semester to link first and second semester classes, the maximum deadline can be estimated as the time after all classes for this year are completed.

Shim Min-cheol, Director of Talent Policy Planning at the Ministry of Education, said, “Usually, failure is decided if a student is absent 3 to 4 times at the beginning of the semester, but currently flexible academic management is being applied,” and added, “We will proceed until early June so that students can return as much as possible.”

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