Education Reform? The Market Has the Answer

Education is said to be a plan for the next hundred years of a nation. It is also said that if you look at the state of a country’s education, you can see its future. In other words, education is that important to a nation’s long-term prospects. Indeed, is it not widely acknowledged around the world that Korea’s extraordinary zeal for education played a major role in the country’s dazzling economic achievements—admired worldwide and often called the “Miracle on the Han River”? Yet warning signs have been flashing over Korean education for quite some time now. The “experiments” in education policy that have been announced and implemented one after another have only fueled confusion and side effects.

From the outset of its term, the current administration also made the need for “education reform” one of its major reform tasks. But there have only been declarations of education reform; even now, after the first half of its term has passed, it has still not clearly stated where the reform is headed or what concrete policies it intends to pursue. Fortunately(?) the government announced the day before yesterday that it would devote its utmost efforts in the second half of its term to major reform tasks, including education reform. I hope this time it will show something different. By “something different,” I mean not only that it should stop at mere declarations and actually take action, but also that the direction of its policies should truly fit the word “reform.” Of these two meanings, the latter—that is, the direction of policy—is in fact more important than the former, action itself. If the direction a policy is aiming for is wrong, it would be better not to move at all.

As is well known, the biggest problem in Korean education is the “poor quality of public education.” Schools have degenerated from places where students teach and learn into places they go simply because they are told to, places to rest, places to sleep. The task of teaching and learning is being handled almost entirely not by schools but by private education. According to a joint survey by the Ministry of Education and Statistics Korea, total private education spending for elementary, middle, and high schools in 2023 amounted to about 27.1 trillion won, and the participation rate in private education was 78.5 percent. In other words, most students are studying through private educational institutions. People say that “dragons no longer rise from small streams,” and this is one reason why. Children from families that cannot easily afford private education may be placed at a disadvantage.

In truth, this problem has already been pointed out time and again, and everyone knows that “reviving public education” is an urgent task. Yet whenever the government says it wants to save public education, the direction of policy always turns toward “cracking down on private education.” This kind of approach is not limited to education; it is the same in many other areas as well. For example, under the banner of “reviving traditional markets,” the government moves to regulate large supermarkets and large shopping malls. In short, it picks a scapegoat and shifts all causes, responsibility, and attention in that direction. The result is obvious. Just as no one says traditional markets have been revived by regulating large supermarkets, public education will never be revived by suppressing private education.

The reason public education has become poor and been shunned while private education flourishes is not hard to find. Private education strengthens its competitiveness by innovating again and again. Public education, by contrast, rests on vested interests and fiercely resists innovation. The reason these opposite patterns appear in private and public education is also clear. In private education, institutions must constantly strive and innovate so as not to fall behind in the competition to win the interest and choice of students and parents, who are education consumers. But in public education, there is no reason to do so. The government brings in the “customers” on its own, there is no competition, and therefore there is no fear of being forced out. The poor quality of public education and its rejection by education consumers are the natural results.

The way to revive public education—and the direction education reform should take—is to introduce competition among schools and among teachers in school education, and to restore the right of choice to students and parents. By introducing competition into school education, schools and teachers, just as in private education, should be made to strive continuously and innovate in order to win the choice of education consumers. Consumer choice and competition are essential characteristics of the market. The answer to education reform, too, lies in the market.

Hyukchul Kwon, Director of the Free Market Institute

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Original title: 교육개혁? 시장에 답이 있다

Author: Hyeok-cheol Kwon

Date: 2024-11-13

Source: https://www.cfe.org/bbs/bbsDetail.php?cid=column&pn=1&idx=27015