National History to be Independent and Mandatory Subject in Secondary Education

The National History Development Committee briefed Kim Jin-pyo, deputy prime minister and minister of education and human resources development, on March 29 that the government should separate history from sociology in the middle school curriculum, and designate modern and contemporary national history as a mandatory subject.

The committee was launched last September as an advisory body under the deputy prime minister that consists of 10 experts from various sectors to counter China’s attempt to distort the history of the ancient Korean kingdom of Goguryeo. It proposed a short-term measure in which history, currently a part of sociology in the middle school curriculum, should be separated into an independent subject in an effort to offer the right perspective of history through balanced education on national and world history. Furthermore, it stressed that the government should designate modern and contemporary national history as a mandatory subject for second and third graders in high school, and increase the proportion of modern history in national history education for first-year high school students.

Under the current curriculum, first graders in middle school learn world history one hour per week, while second and third graders attend national history classes one hour and two hours a week, respectively.

In high school, first-year students take national history classes two hours a week as a mandatory subject. Modern and contemporary national history and world history are classified as electives for second graders and higher.

Seong-Chul Hong sungchul@donga.com