Government to cut recruitment of new teachers

The number of newly recruited elementary and middle school teachers will be slashed by more than a quarter over the next four years in response to the country’s shrinking student population, the Ministry of Education said Monday.

A first-grade classroom in Changwon, South Gyeongsang, on March 2 [YONHAP]

The number of newly recruited elementary and middle school teachers will be slashed by more than a quarter over the next four years in response to the country’s shrinking student population, the Ministry of Education said Monday.

The announcement immediately prompted criticism from teacher advocacy groups and students at education universities preparing to become teachers, who argued that the reduction will only undermine public education and increase students’ dependence on hagwon, or private academies.

According to the ministry’s so-called mid-to-long-term teacher supply plan, the number of new elementary and middle school teachers will be reduced by an annual maximum of 2,400 by 2027, 28 percent less than this year.

New elementary school teachers will go down from this year’s 3,561 to about 2,600. New middle school teachers will be shrunk to about 3,500 from this year’s 4,898.

Next year alone, around 360 fewer elementary school teachers will be recruited than this year.

“The significance of this medium to long-term teacher supply plan is that it proactively and efficiently responds to the student population decrease,” said Education Minister and Deputy Prime Minister Lee Ju-ho.

“We must use the student population decline as an opportunity to enhance the quality of education and cultivate competent talents.”

In explaining why fewer teachers will be recruited, education officials pointed to the sharp student population decline, stressing that a reduction was “inevitable.”

Data from Statistics Korea show that the number of elementary, middle and high school students at public schools in Korea is expected to shrink by about 13 percent to 3.81 million in the next four years. By 2038, the number of elementary school students is expected to be down by 34 percent compared to this year, while the corresponding rate for middle and high school students is predicted to be 46 percent.

As for nationwide education universities that train prospective teachers, an official from the Education Ministry said the government will make “gradual adjustments” to the size of their student bodies while discussing the matter with the schools.

There are currently 13 universities across the nation that professionally trains elementary school teachers, and they accepted 3,847 freshmen this year in total, which was more than the number of new elementary school teachers recruited.

Teacher advocacy groups berated the ministry’s announcement, saying the reduction will only cause problems such as bullying, depression and suicide to worsen.

“Teacher supply is a key factor determining the quality of student education,” said Jo Seong-cheol, spokesperson for the Korea Federation of Teachers’ Association. “We need more teachers to properly observe and interact with each individual student.”

Song Gyeong-won, a member of the Justice Party’s policy committee, chimed in, saying that reducing new teachers will only fuel the “vicious cycle” that leads to smaller classrooms, closed schools and “vanishing” local communities.

BY LEE GA-RAM,LEE SUNG-EUN [lee.sungeun@joongang.co.kr]