Tens of thousands of teachers in South Korea started a strike on Monday in protest against harassment by parents against teachers.
The background of the protests is the suicide of a 23-year-old teacher in July, which is believed to have been caused by the constant harassment of the students’ parents.
British Broadcasting Corporation BBC has known someone who committed suicide Lee Min-son (victim’s name changed at the request of the family) to the diary entries of this cousin Park Du-yong’s with assistance.
On June 5, Lee had described the fear she felt when she entered the classroom: “My chest is tight. I’m afraid I’m going to fall. I don’t even know where I am.”
By July, Lee’s anxiety had gotten worse. In a letter dated July 3, he stated that he can’t handle all the craziness associated with work and that he wants to “let go.”
Two weeks later, Lee’s colleagues found him dead in his classroom closet.
Lee survived in his profession for a little over a year. He had ended up in the field following in his mother’s footsteps, and Park says that his cousin called the job of a teacher his dream profession.
In South Korea, Lee’s case has caused tens of thousands to demand better protection for teachers from the constant and increasingly egregious harassment of students’ parents. According to the teachers, the parents call them complaining every day of the week and around the clock, and talk to them in a degrading and commanding tone.
The diaries found in Lee’s apartment show that he too had been the subject of incessant complaints from his parents. In the last case, Lee had intervened in a situation where a student had cut his classmate with scissors. Handling the situation had led to heated phone conversations with the parents.
Threatening parents burdens teachers
Lee’s case is not the only one of its kind, which sparked a public debate about how teachers cope. Korea Herald according to yesterday Sunday alone, two teachers decided to take their own lives. According to Reuters data, more than a hundred cases have been registered in the past six years.
It is believed that there are many reasons for the plight of teachers. In South Korea, society is very performance-oriented, and children compete with each other from a young age to get into the best schools. Even one failed annual exam may close certain educational opportunities for children once and for all.
The birth rate in South Korea has been declining for a long time. Today in the country, it is common for a family to have only one child, and parents may place enormous pressures of success on the shoulders of their only child.
Children may not be able to handle the pressure placed on them, which is why they vent their frustration through violent or otherwise disruptive behavior. At the same time, the means to intervene in disruptive behavior in schools have been taken away from teachers based on changes in the law.
With the law that entered into force in 2014, even the slightest suspicion of child abuse automatically leads to the dismissal of the teacher. Over the years, students’ parents have learned to blackmail and threaten teachers with baseless reports.
Teachers have been reported if they have restrained a violent child, while talking to a child could be interpreted as mental abuse. Teachers find the constant fear of losing their jobs extremely burdensome.
One of the teachers interviewed by the BBC was reported after he refused to wake up a child every morning by making a phone call. Another teacher says that he received a report of emotional abuse when he had removed the award stickers from a child who ran amok with scissors.
South Korea used to be known as a country where teachers were valued and respected. However, the country’s rapid economic growth has affected how teachers are treated.
– Many parents today are highly educated, and that has made them look down on teachers. They feel they have paid for the teachers in the form of taxes, training teachers in Seoul Kim Bong-je tells the BBC.
Numerous teachers interviewed by the BBC say that they have taken breaks and sick leave from their work due to depression and panic attacks caused by parental pressure. Suicidal thoughts are also emphasized in the teachers’ stories.
– We feel powerless. Those who have not experienced this personally have seen it happen to others. It’s discouraging in every way, 28-year-old teacher Kim Jin-seo.
He also says that he considered suicide after two particularly aggressive complaints. In the first case, he had asked a disruptive student to think about his actions for five minutes outside of class. In another case, he had sent home a notice about a child’s participation in a fight.
Parents’ attitudes have also changed in Finland
The problems experienced by teachers in South Korea may soon lead to a huge shortage of teachers, if solutions are not found. According to the latest surveys, only a quarter of teachers say that they are satisfied with their work, and a large majority say that they have considered a change of field during the previous year.
Head of education policy at the OAJ Professional Association of Education Jaakko Salo says that even in Europe there are problems with the attractiveness of the teaching profession. According to him, there is even a crying shortage of teachers in certain countries.
– In Finland, the situation is somewhat better, and there is not a similar all-encompassing shortage of teachers here. We have a shortage of early childhood education teachers in particular, but there are also regional challenges in hiring primary school teachers, says Salo.
Salo sees that the attractiveness of the education sector in Finland is mainly weakened by the lack of resources in schools. Too large class sizes and the growing number of students who need special education have made the work even more burdensome for teachers.
The workload has caused many teachers in Finland to consider changing fields. According to Salo, it is important to take care of the attractiveness of the teacher’s work before the situation gets even worse.
He would not talk about the widespread persecution of teachers in Finland, although he admits that the tone of certain messages sent by parents has become more critical and pointed.
– There have also been cases in Finland where parents, instead of talking to the teacher, have contacted the principal or threatened to file complaints with the municipality’s education department.
– In recent years, a certain kind of customer thinking has crept into Finland and parents have started to demand certain kinds of services from schools. This kind of “customer is always right” thinking is extremely bad for the school environment. The interaction between teachers and parents should be seen more as a team game.
According to Salo, there is one big and decisive difference in the Finnish education system compared to the arrangements in South Korea and many other countries.
– All our schools are of top quality, and therefore we do not have the same school and educational institution competition as abroad.
– In other countries, part of the pressure comes from the fact that parents try to choose the right path for their child at an early stage, through which they would have the opportunity to get into good schools and certain top universities.
According to Salo, there is no fear in Finland that certain paths will be closed due to some choices.
– With us, it is possible to get eligibility for all secondary education from every elementary school, and from there on to any higher education institution in Finland. Here, the study place depends more on your own abilities.
You can discuss teacher challenges until Wednesday, September 6 at 11 p.m.