이명박 정부 교육정책에 대한 평가와 과제 - 신자유주의 고등교육정책을 중심으로 -

Abstract

In this Paper, I intended to analyze a series of new higher education reform policies of Lee Myung-bak government. They are commonly characterized by ‘marketization’ and ‘autonomy and accountability’ of higher education. The ‘marketization’ was an extensive introduction of competition mechanism in the field of higher education, and ‘University autonomy and accountability’ was privatization. Public education system will be threatened if higher education services are included in neo-liberalistic moves. The right to get a good education becomes more and more a question of money. The Ministry of Education, Science and Technology emphasized national competitiveness in the 21st century knowledge-based society and the quality of human resources. But in my opinion national human resources development policy did not justify the new higher education reform policies. Because human resources development on the national level does not become the goal of public higher education. We want an education system for people, not for profits, which has been shown at a series of student demonstrations such as “tonsure protests” by university students. This also brought criticisms from the opposition, the Democratic Party. In Korea students have to pay tuitions and fees to colleges or universities. Pay increases have caused chronic controversy. Household spending on higher education has been rising inexorably over the past few years, aside from a temporary dip during the financial crisis. Significant progress is necessary in the restructuring of higher education in Korea. Korean higher education shows several distinctive features when compared with other countries. First of all, the majority of higher education institutions are private. About 87% of higher education institutions are private. About 78% of university students and 96% of professional school students enrolls in private institutions. As private institutions rely heavily on tuition revenue, their fees are considerably high. Even public universities in Korea charge substantial tuition, because governmental support for higher education in Korea is too small. Public financial expenditures on higher education as a percentage of GDP are very low at 0.3%. The net result is that the household sector bears the bulk of the financial burden for higher education. The proportion of governmental subsidies was limited to 22.3%, much lower than the OECD average(68.9%)(Education at a Glance 2011). Partly the rapid expansion of higher education supply has started to exceed the demand. In spite of the outward goal i. e., strengthening the global competitiveness of universities, the policy of the Ministry of Educations, Science And Technology has focused on shutdown of private institutions. The government has launched a campaign to restructure universities by weeding out financially-week private schools and merging state-run ones. The government’s move to weed out underperforming schools is tied to its tuition-cut drive. Korea needs to reform the universities with reviewing ways to lower tuition. But the proper way of higher education reform should begin to subsidizing higher education institution. The government needs to increase financial subsidy rather than weeding out substandard schools to upgrade the quality of higher education. Korea’s public education spending per student was lower than the average of other OECD member states, according to the organization’s 2011 edition of Education at a Glance. Under purchasing power parity(PPP), the conversion index used to compare price levels for different countries, Korea’s public education spending per student stood at $9,081 for higher education schools, lower than the OECD average of $13,717. The government did not invest properly in higher education. We point out that the government needs to spend more on public education.