Allegations of a so-called “private education cartel” in which school teachers provided practice test questions to private education companies and received large sums of money have been proven to be true. An audit conducted by the Board of Audit and Inspection of Korea revealed that a significant number of teachers who took the College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) or wrote EBS CSAT-related textbooks shared questions with private tutoring companies for monetary gain. The Ministry of Education announced that 26 teachers and academy officials were being investigated in September last year, but the audit has referred 56 individuals for investigation.
The recent revelation by the Board of Audit and Inspection of Korea is quite alarming. A high school teacher, who was a reviewer for the CSAT and mock assessments, formed an organization to provide questions to private educational institutions with eight teachers. Over a period of four years, from 2019 to 2023, the teacher in question, referred to as ‘A’, received $502,283 (660 million won) for making over 2,000 mock test questions with his accomplice and then sold them to lecturers at a famous cram school. Many of these teachers concealed the fact that they were selling questions to private companies and participating in the CSAT and practice tests. This “private education cartel” is the reason why the English section of the 2023 SAT was the same as the private practice test questions created by famous instructors from large admission agencies or the EBS SAT textbooks.
In the private education market, institutions that have similar questions to the CSAT tend to attract more students and make more money. Unfortunately, some teachers participate in this cartel, pushing students towards private education while earning huge sums of money themselves. Some teachers used the same questions they sold to the academy as midterm and final exams at their schools. High school grades are a crucial factor in the college entrance examination, and it is illegal that these teachers have allowed their students who went to private educational institutions to get good grades. It is unlikely that these teachers taught their students with more than a desire to make money in the private education market. We need to investigate further to see if this is the tip of the iceberg.
This case calls into question the fundamental principle of fairness in Korea’s college admissions system. The fairness and credibility of the CSAT will be hugely affected. The Korea Institute of Curriculum and Evaluation, the body responsible for administering and overseeing the CSAT, failed verifying the exam questions and tried to play it off as “coincidence” despite the clear possibility of collusion in the English section. The institute must be held accountable for their actions.The institute must be held accountable for their actions.
