Government To Ease Requirements On Foreigners’ Schools

Regulations preventing Korean students from applying to foreigners’ schools in the country are going to be alleviated.

In addition, a program designed to help foreign students with the requisite number of units to apply to highly reputed universities around the world will be introduced in the foreigner’s school that is slated to be established at Yongsan, Seoul.

On November 19, the Ministry of Commerce, Industry and Energy (MOCIE), the Federation of Korea Industries (FKI), and the Korea Trade-Investment Promotion Agency (KOTRA), assembled at Shilla Hotel, Jangchung-dong in Jung-gu, Seoul, to hold a forum discussing ways to improve the management and living conditions of the foreigners in Korea, releasing the “Foreigner’s Living Conditions Improvement: A Five-year Plan, 100 themes.”

The plan has eight sections covering topics including education, medical care, and residency. The government has confirmed that it would institute the “Ordinance for Foreign-Based School Establishment and Management,” which the Ministry of Education & Human Resources Development (MOE) originally introduced as legislation to the Congress in 2002.

The main focuses of the plan are efforts to “reduce the school’s overseas residency requirement on natives from five years to three years,” to “permit the native educational foundations to establish foreign schools” and to “approve the foreign high school degrees as equivalent to those of native high schools.”

These measures had been postponed by the presidential duty preparation committee due to resistance from education-based agencies.

MOCIE has also decided to introduce the International Baccalaureate (IB) program into the foreigner’s school scheduled to open in 2006 in Yongsan, Seoul. IB programs have been set up in order to prepare foreign students who have taken six basic courses, including language, science, and social science, for the entrance exams of highly reputed universities around the world.

In terms of financial support of the foreigner’s school, MOCIE established the following provisions: “Allow companies to categorize contributions to foreigner’s schools as pecuniary funds, under 50 percent of its total sale,” “Reduce the lease rates,” and “Support the management fund of foreigner’s schools in the countryside.”

To address issues surrounding living conditions, MOCIE decided to carry out measures that would “introduce standardized English housing contract forms for foreigners,” “improve upon the custom of prepaid monthly rent,” “develop housing-financial instruments for foreigners,” “designate medical centers for foreigners,” “set up a hotline between foreigner’s hospitals,” and “recommend that foreigners register for health insurance.”

In addition, people investing over $100 million in Korea will be given the right to settle in the country regardless of their period of stay in Korea. Moreover, foreigners over 20 years of age who have lived in Korea for over a year and have registered as a foreigner will not be required to go through the fingerprint registration process.

This plan will be discussed by the East Asia Economic Center Preparation Committee at the end of this year, and implemented beginning next year.

Ki-Jeong Ko koh@donga.com