Hye-Min Park is 16 and lives in the JXUwMDM5JXUwMDA3JXUwMDAwJXUwMDBhJXUwMDE5JXUwMDEwJXUwMDBiJXUwMDFh Seoul district of Gangnam, made famous by the pop star Psy. Her day is typical of that of the majority of South Korean teenagers.She JXUwMDJhJXUwMDFiJXUwMDFhJXUwMDE2JXUwMDE2 at 6.30am, is at school by 8am, finishes at 4pm, (or 5pm if she has a club), then JXUwMDI4JXUwMDFmJXUwMDFmJXUwMDAz back home to eat.She then takes a bus to her second school shift of the day, at a JXUwMDI4JXUwMDAyJXUwMDFiJXUwMDFmJXUwMDE3JXUwMDE1JXUwMDEx crammer or hagwon, where she has lessons from 6pm until 9pm.She spends JXUwMDM5JXUwMDBmJXUwMDAxJXUwMDFiJXUwMDFjJXUwMDBkJXUwMDE3 two hours in what she calls self-study back at school, before arriving home after 11pm. She goes to bed at 2am, and rises in the morning at 6.30am to do it all over again.
She says she would like to get more sleep but it's her job to JXUwMDM3JXUwMDE5JXUwMDEzJXUwMDE3JXUwMDExJXUwMDBjJXUwMDAyJXUwMDA4 it. To get the qualifications to follow her dream career JXUwMDM5JXUwMDEy a teacher she has to work hard she says, and JXUwMDNhJXUwMDA3JXUwMDE2JXUwMDFhJXUwMDBkJXUwMDAxJXUwMDE2 she likes studying, and learning new things.Hye-Min's mother Yoon-Gyeong Hwang says she worries about her daughter, but they have no choice when it comes to JXUwMDMwJXUwMDA5JXUwMDE3JXUwMDFmJXUwMDA3JXUwMDA5 to compete.
This relentless JXUwMDNlJXUwMDA5JXUwMDBjJXUwMDE2JXUwMDA2 on education has resulted in formidable exam performers. It's the sort of performance that makes education ministers in the UK and beyond look on with envy, and has them actively remodelling the curriculum and exams to try to emulate them.
The JXUwMDMwJXUwMDFkJXUwMDEyJXUwMDAy investment in education has also resulted in an economy that's grown at an astonishing rate since the end of the war with North Korea 60 years ago.
South Korea has in two generations gone from mass illiteracy to being an economic powerhouse.But it's come at a big cost. The relentless pressure means Korea JXUwMDMwJXUwMDA3JXUwMDAzJXUwMDA4JXUwMDE3 another much less enviable record, that of having the highest suicide rate of industrialised OECD countries.
It's a price the country is now gradually starting to weigh up.
|
AFFLUENT
|
ALTHOUGH
|
ANOTHER
|
AS
|
BESIDES
|
|
FOCUS
HUGE
LIKE
|
HAVING
OVERCOME
|
HOLDS
POPS
|
HOWEVER
PRIVATE
|
INVESTMENT
RISES
|
Adapted from BBC Education and family