[칼럼] Korea Story 34 - Education 3  by Atty Jeong-kee Kim

(NewsKorea=Seoul) Digital News Team = Korea Story 34 - <Education 3  by Atty Jeong-kee Kim>

● The dark future of the queuing society

In our society, the college entrance exam, which is even called a war, and the craze for tutoring that is straining parents' backs are one of the serious social contradictions. Every time the government changed, reform plans were put forward several times to relieve the overheating of college entrance exams, but they failed each time, and instead the cost of private education was raised enormously. 

The competition in Korean college admissions is a battle fought over entry into a few prestigious universities, and this battle is a winner-takes-all, determining one’s value and social status for a lifetime based on whether they get into a prestigious university or not. How can one retreat from this war?

The driving force behind pushing students and parents into endless competition is the university ranking system, which has solidified into a social status criterion. The approximately 200 four-year universities in Korea are ranked in a single file with Seoul National University at the top. The hierarchy of one's alma mater directly translates into their social ranking, leading everyone to engage in a fierce battle to attend the highest-ranked universities.

As a result of the contradictions arising from university ranking, Korean universities inevitably suffer from diminished international competitiveness. When the university ranking is already fixed and immutable, why bother competing? Looking up is futile and looking down yields nothing more, so maintaining the status quo is sufficient. If there is any talk about international competitiveness of universities, it can be left to the top-tier universities in Korea. For those below that level, fixed rankings are the norm.

Competition is triggered when a similar opponent is right next to you. Even for high school students who are ranked first in the entire school, rather than ‘studying with the goal of being first in the country,’ they do not give up on their studies when other students from the same school are constantly threatening their top spot. 

 If our universities, entrenched in a fixed ranking structure, do not strive to enhance their competitiveness, it would be detrimental not only to individuals but also to the future of the nation. The world no longer tolerates frogs in a well. Whether we like it or not, in the era of infinite competition that we face, both individuals and the nation must survive and cannot afford to lag behind.

During my time studying in the U.S., I was envious of American students. Regardless of whether they attended top-tier universities or not, they all had a strong sense of pride and affection for their schools. I never heard of anyone saying, "I just went to a mediocre university," or feeling inferior or diminished because of it. This contrasts sharply with the severe academic complex prevalent in Korea, despite the fact that university rankings are also published annually in the U.S.

Due to difficult family circumstances I dropped out of the high school which I attended
as a full scholarship student and entered a U.S. university directly after passing the high school equivalency exam, graduating as the top student. 

In Korea, an underdeveloped country in the 1980s, studying abroad in the United States was a high-cost structure that only children with parents in the top 0.001% of income could choose, so I was a special case as I went on my own without financial support from my parents. I decided to study in the United States because I liked the educational climate in the United States, but when I actually studied in the United States, the situation was very different from ours. People in the United States considered it important that the school they currently attend or the school they graduated from was the school of their choice. This is because they choose the school that best suits them by considering their career path, aptitude, standard of living, and circumstances, and not the school they are forced into like we are. 

In the U.S., students choose schools according to their own standards and circumstances, which means there is no uniform standard for what constitutes a good school. There are only schools that fit each individual’s needs. Of course, the range of choices can vary greatly depending on grades and financial conditions. One might attend an expensive Ivy League school on the East Coast or choose a more affordable state university. Thus, even without financial abundance or excellent grades, there are always choices, and there is no insistence on only attending prestigious universities regardless of one’s aptitude or life plans.

Korean students choose schools based on grades rather than individual aptitude or aspirations. But this is an assignment rather than a choice. We think that children who are very good at studying make school decisions of their own choice, but in reality, this is not the case. They just don't realize that they are conforming to society's uniform standards. Rather than considering their aptitude, desired career path, or university environment, students with good grades say, “I have to go to Seoul National University no matter what.” ‘I won’t go to Yonsei University or Korea University or lower,’ he says, fitting his future into a hierarchical framework. 

Most students, who cannot even make such selective choices, lose the opportunity to fully utilize their abilities due to a sense of defeat at not being among the elite. This type of education, which forces everyone to sacrifice their talents and dreams, is a negative system that exacerbates social instability. Even more serious is that the issue of ranking does not end here. Do those who follow only elite paths truly enjoy the glory at the top of the pyramid? A professor from Seoul National University, renowned in his field, once said:
 “No matter how hard I try, there are friends I can never catch up with. Whenever I’m in front of them, I feel diminished. If I had to continue competing with them, I might have given up studying altogether. Being around such friends makes me see only my own inadequacies.”

Even among top students, there are rankings. So, even if only top students are selected, they are still lined up in a row, and these top students also suffer from severe inferiority complexes. Ranking everyone by a uniform standard, despite their different talents and personalities, serves whose convenience? It is evident that rather than stifling the potential of countless individuals for the sake of one top position, it is both personally and socially just to diversify societal measures, allowing individuals to chart their own paths and discover their own value.

Consider the foreign language high schools, which have lost their original function and have become entrance exam powerhouses. Though they are not nationally ranked like Gyeonggi High School or Seoul High School, there is no guarantee that foreign language high schools will not become a new elite group like Gyeonggi or Seoul High in the future. However, merely following elite paths cannot escape the drawbacks of ranking. Those at the top of the ranking are also victims of the system's limitations, as they are unable to recognize its harmful effects. Unfortunately, in an educational environment like Korea's, one cannot experience the diverse nature of individual happiness. The only perceived evidence of success and happiness is occupying a top spot in the rankings.

When I went abroad in my twenties to study political science and again in my thirties for law school, I did not harbor illusions or desires for Ivy League schools. It was not because I lacked a sense of ranking like Americans but because I was well aware of the drawbacks of ranking, which led me to adopt a form of self-defense.

Because I so keenly experienced the system in this country that ignores the potential and value of everyone except the top performers, I wanted to choose an environment where I could maximize my potential and confirm that I am a worthy human being. 

When I graduated summa cum laude from the State University of New York at Stony Brook with BA in political science and received acceptance letters from Harvard University's Divinity School and Columbia University's Graduate School of International Studies, I didnt go to one of those two prestigious universities. The reason was partly due to the high tuition fees at private universities without scholarships, but I knew I would reach my full potential at Stony Brook University rather than go to a top university and be buried as an ordinary person. I concluded that I would go to a top-ranked state university where I could shine as a student and that would exempt me from tuition and even provide living expenses. 
Even if I became the head of a chicken, I did not want to be the tail of a cow. Since I felt that it was more important to demonstrate my abilities to the fullest than to have a good academic background, there was no need to insist on being top-notch, and I was able to choose practicality over advertising without much thought. Even now, I have no regrets about the choice I made at the time, and I am proud of Stony Brook University I graduated from. 

Korean students studying in the U.S. often carry the obsession with prestige, as evidenced by the Korean students I met there. Many could not let go of their fixation on elite universities, even while studying in the U.S. At that time, if one was among the top 10% in their class at the State University of New York at Stony Brook, it was relatively easy to transfer to an Ivy League school like Columbia, and even Cornell, which was part of the State University of New York system. Unlike Korean universities, American universities have an open transfer system with no prejudices against transfer students, as alumni status is determined by graduation rather than admission. U.S. Presidents Kennedy and Obama were also transfer students who graduated from Harvard and Columbia, respectively. Have you ever seen the “backward” Korean societal shadow over transfer students in these cases? At the State University of New York at Stony Brook, many excellent students worked hard in their first and second years to improve their grades, and then transferred to Columbia or Cornell in their junior and senior years. This phenomenon can be attributed to the economics of money and the practical nature of Americans. Spending two years at a flagship state university and the remaining two years at a private elite university can save approximately 100 million won, significantly reducing the burden of student loan repayment after graduation.

“Why don’t you transfer to Columbia? Your grades are in the top 1%, so you’re bound to get accepted. I plan to do that if my grades are good this semester.”

One day, a Korean honor student friend I was studying with recommended that I transfer to Columbia, emphasizing that Ivy League schools seemed far more impressive than Stony Brook university. He said that returning to Korea after studying abroad with an Ivy League degree would be much more prestigious. In reality, he came from a wealthy family in Honam region with a National Assembly member as his father, while I had worked as a star English instructor at Korea University and Yonsei University from the age of 20, and my college English textbook, written at 22 just before going abroad, was popular at major universities like Seoul National University, Sogang University, and Ewha Womans University in additionto Yonsei University and Korea University. However, as a citizen of South Korea in the 1980s with a per capita income of only $3,000, the tuition fees of Ivy League schools were still unaffordable, so I had never been interested in them from the start.
 
I wanted to dissuade my friend. Few students who transferred to Ivy League schools ended up completing their studies as originally planned. Most of those who transferred ended up with only an undergraduate degree. There were almost no cases where they completed Ph. D programs in graduate schools or became medical doctors or lawyers in professional schools as originally intended. Of course, if one’s major is unique or there is a professor they particularly want to learn from, it doesn’t matter if they finish just the undergraduate program or get a Ph.D. However, in most cases, students often choose based on prestige rather than the actual value of their studies. The important thing is not which university you graduated from, but whether you studied what you wanted and made appropriate choices to follow your desired path.

For young people at the crossroads of choosing their future, it is crucial to understand what path they need to take to do what they currently want and to study what is necessary for their life. However, in our society, where there is only one criterion for selection, this realization is hindered. It merely drives individuals to focus solely on securing a top position, making them lose their sense of direction. Amazingly, the social system itself restricts individuals with immense potential from fully realizing their capabilities.

The way to overcome this problem, as I have said repeatedly, is to diversify the standards of our society. In a system with pluralistic standards, anyone can demonstrate 100 or more abilities by developing and developing their own values. 

Unless we quickly abolish the inhumane system we have maintained, our society, which is obsessed with making all 99 people last in order to make one person number one, will only run toward a tragedy with no hope of recovery.

☆ Author:  Atty Jeong-kee Kim ☆

● Education
- Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, Summa Cum Laude, State University of New York at Stony Brook
-  Doctor of Jurisprudence, Marquette University Law School
- Senior Executive Program, John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
- Research Scholar in North Korean Studies, Peking University

● Experience
- Consul General of the Republic of Korea in Shanghai
- Commissioner General for the Korean Pavilion at the 2010 Shanghai Expo
- CEO, Asia-Pacific Local Government Network for Economic and Social Development (CityNet)
- Secretary General, World Smart Sustainable Cities Organization(WeGO)
- Law Clerk, Milwaukee Circuit Court, USA
- Senior Attorney-at-Law, Dr & Aju LLC
- Distinguished Visiting Professor, World Economy Research Institute, Nanjing University
- Research Professor, Institute of Oriental Studies, Peking University
- Distinguished Professor, Graduate School of Political Science, Kookmin University
- Chair Professor, Graduate School of Business, Dongguk University
- First President of Soongsil Cyber University

● Publications
- Georo English Studies Series for College Students [10 volumes] (Georo Publishing)
- I Challenge the Possibility of One Percent (Chosun Ilbo)
- The Art of Negotiation (Cheongnyonneongsin Publishing)
- Korea and the World (Chekmidum Publishing)