South Korea: 249 teachers at private tutoring center earn nearly $15 million by selling mock exams

Over six years, 249 teachers at private tutoring centers earned nearly $15 million by selling mock exams, even though the practice is illegal in South Korea.

Daechi "extra-curricular study street" in Seoul is still lit up and bustling with students and parents even though it's 10pm - Photo: CHOSUN ILBO

The Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) of South Korea announced on February 18 that 249 teachers at private tutoring centers earned 21.29 billion won (nearly 15 million USD) over six years by selling mock exams for the college entrance exam (also known as the Suneung College Scholastic Ability Test or CSAT).

Specifically, these teachers received an average of 85 million won (about 59,000 USD) each when selling exam review questions and mock exams from 2018 to June 2023.

The Seoul metropolitan area and Gyeonggi Province are the places where the most mock test transactions take place in Korea, with the total amount of transactions reaching 19.88 billion won (about 13.8 million USD).

In Seoul alone, transactions for buying and selling mock exams are most concentrated in the "extra-curricular study street" area of ​​Daechi Ward, part of the "rich area" of Gangnam, and Mok Ward, part of Yangcheon District.

Among the subjects, parents and students spent the most money to buy review questions and practice tests for natural science, with 6.62 billion won (about 4.6 million USD).

Next are math (5.71 billion won), social sciences (3.77 billion won), English (3.1 billion won) and Korean (2.08 billion won).

To get the test preparation questions and mock tests, lecturers and teachers at private tutoring centers have contacted the compilers of the Korean Ministryof Education 's test preparation books through personal relationships, or "connected" with teachers who specialize in compiling the most difficult "killer questions" in university entrance exams to classify excellent students.

However, in Korea, the act of buying and selling exam preparation materials and mock tests is illegal. “The act of teachers compiling their own exam preparation questions and selling mock tests to private tutoring centers is a violation of Article 64 of the Korean National Public Service Act,” said a BAI official.

Strong measures still cannot stop private tutoring and selling mock exam papers

The university entrance exam in Korea is known as the most difficult exam in life and is considered the decisive step in the future of the whole life.

Therefore, many parents do not hesitate to spend money for their children to study at private tutoring centers after regular school hours. Many parents also try to take advantage of personal relationships, willing to spend a large amount of money to hunt for mock test sets, question sets in the group of "killer questions" so that their children can complete the university entrance exam as well as possible.

For a long time, the Korean government has been trying to suppress private tutoring and the sale of exam preparation questions in order to create the fairest learning and testing environment for all students, but it seems that parents' high expectations for their children have made these efforts ineffective.

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Source: https://tuoitre.vn/han-quoc-249-giao-vien-tai-trung-tam-day-them-tu-kiem-gan-15-trieu-usd-nho-ban-de-thi-thu-20250218161343482.htm