[Editorial] Classes before First Class Must Be Abolished

It was shocking for me to watch a TV program contrasting the class scenes of Korea and other advanced countries. In Korea, high school students arrived at school from 7:00 AM still having drowsy eyes. On arriving at their classroom, students went to sleep on their desks and the teachers would not be bothered to wake them up. Most Korean students said that they come to school without having breakfast. In contrast, the high school students of advanced countries come to school at 9:00 AM with bright smiles and concentrated on their classes. The reason why Korean students come to school so early is for so called `the zero class hour,` which means the autonomous study hours a couple hours before the first class begins.

Concerning the zero class hour, controversies are spreading through the Korean society. Recently, letters and notes urging to abolish the zero class hours are repeatedly delivered and published in the homepage of the Ministry of Education and Human Resources Development. An expert group, `Children and Adolescents Forum,` strongly urges to abolish the zero class hours.

It is really heartbreaking that the young boys and girls are living in such situation that they have to go to school so early without having breakfast. Regardless to say the malign influences on their growing body, I was so worried about the excessive stress betrayed on their frowned faces for the university entrance exams.

The resolution for the zero class hour is relatively simple no matter how much the entrance exam competition is severe. The answer will come out easily by questioning how much the zero class helps students. According to teachers, many students just sleep at the zero class hours and it badly affects the following classes. The zero class brings about a negative effect on the study of high school students. Once the zero class hour is abolished, students shall have more time to increase their study efficiency.

High school teachers are fully acknowledging this but saying it is difficult to abolish the zero class hours. If a school abolish the zero class hour at first while other schools maintain it, the school will be blamed as a school that to not teach students very hard. The stiffness and opportunism of the school administration is very surprising in that, even though they fully recognize the problem of the zero class hour, they are still enforcing the unreasonable policies while studying the moves of other schools.

Besides the individual schools, it is doubtful whether the Ministry of Education and the Offices of Education have been recognizing this problem. It is very worried what other unreasonable things are happening in the schools under the shadow of social indifferences. The Educational authority must take action right away.