In the wake of the recent tragedy at Seoul Seo2 Elementary School, there has been a nationwide call to bolster the authority of teachers and standardize public education. Teachers across the nation took to the street to protest 11 times, resulting in the passing of the Teachers Rights Restoration Bill and new guidelines by the Ministry of Education. Despite these strides forward, concerns linger over remaining blind spots in early childhood education and special education.
Advocating for kindergarten teachers’ rights and well-being
The problem of malicious complaints and child abuse accusations in kindergartens has recently emerged as a serious issue. While systems for the protection of teaching rights are concentrated in the systems of elementary, middle, and high schools, kindergarten teachers find themselves in a blind-spot. According to a casebook of educational activity infringement released by the Public Kindergarten Teachers Union, 68 percent of surveyedkindergarten teachers answered that they had suffered from infringement of their educational rights, including unreasonable complaints from parents.
Unlike elementary and middle schools, kindergartens lack school education protection committees, leaving teachers vulnerable to baseless complaints. Compared to the revision made in December to the Elementary and Secondary Education Act, which legally outlined teachers’ rights regarding life guidance, regulations specifically addressing kindergarten teachers are notably absent.
Yu Hyeongjun, an undergraduate majoring in early childhood education, is currently studying to become a kindergarten teacher. Yu explained that the recent tragedy saddens him to witness the emergence of problems such as the infringement of teaching rights.
“In some ways, teaching is a job full of pure love,” Yu said. “I take this position with the mindset of loving my future students, and I believe thatpeople who work in education or are dreaming of doing so will feel the same. Strengthening the laws that guarantee the authority of educators should consider these perspectives.”
In his eyes, the strengthening of teachers’ rights guarantees brought about by the recent revisions to the Early Childhood Education Act among the Teachers Right Restoration Bill was good news for prospective teachers. Prior to this change, personal information such as teachers’ phone numbers and resident registration numbers were not properly protected. However, among the newly established contents, Yu highlighted one important development which emphasized the need for heads of kindergartens to take necessary measures to safeguard teachers’ personal information.
Yu also pointed out that the revision does not yet fully protect teachers’ rights, given that the scope of emotional abuse provisions is still overly ambiguous. He emphasized the crucial role of state intervention, societal support, and school initiatives in fortifying this aspect for ensuring a comprehensive protection of teachers’ rights.
“The recent tragedies made me realize the severity of the infringement of teaching rights,” Yu said. “I think it is a prospective educator’s responsibility to strive for a safe educational environment for both future teachers and those currently dedicated to the field.”
In order to protect the teaching authority of kindergarten teachers and improve their economic and social status, the Public Kindergarten Teachers Union is actively engaging in various activities such as participating in protests as well as aggregating and submitting teachers’ opinions to the government. The union represents regular teachers of national and public kindergartens nationwide, with a mission to uphold teachers’educational activities and standardize early childhood education.
Park Dasom, chairperson of the Public Kindergarten Teachers Union and a teacher at a public kindergarten in Seoul, showed optimism over the Teachers Rights Restoration Bill. She views the bill, which encompasses laws related to the early childhood education sector, as significant progress. This legislative move is seen as crucial in heightening the importance and awareness of early childhood education. Park notes that early childhood education lacked institutional mechanisms and social awareness for protecting educational activities compared to other school levels, and the status of kindergartens as educational institutions was in need of elevation.
“Last year, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act passed the Life Guidance Act, which stipulates the authority of teachers to guide their lives, and it was regrettable that the Early Childhood Education Act was not discussed together at the time,” she said. “However, I am very happy that the Early Childhood Education Act was included in the Teachers Rights Restoration Bill so that the protection of kindergarten teachers’ educationalactivities could be legally guaranteed.”
Park explained that the draft of the Notice to Protect Kindergarten Teachers’ Educational Activities, which was recently implemented to let teachers freely carry out educational activities, was considered to be lacking initially and unsuitable for early childhood education. Nevertheless, as both the union and its members submitted their opinions, many of them were reflected. As the Teachers Rights Restoration Bill was passed, Park stressed that the notice should also be revised, and it is important for the Ministry of Education to actively communicate with on-site kindergarten teachers and reflect their opinions.
Although the first step in guaranteeing a legal framework has been taken, Park stresses securing education finances is essential because detailed realization measures such as workforce and budget allocation have not yet been organized. Furthermore, the laws being discussed so far mainly focus on how to support teachers in the event of the infringement of their rights. Still, she pointed out that it is also necessary to come up with measures to prevent them from happening in the first place.
“The protection of educational activities is not just about protecting teachers’ rights, it is about ensuring children’s right to a safe and high- qualified education,” Park said. “It is also about ensuring that all human beings have their dignity protected. We hope that the provision of institutional and administrative support will continue to help teachers provide better education and see children grow into healthy members of society. The NationalAssembly and the government must listen to teachers and diligently devise plans to address these concerns.”
Special educators need clearer guidelines for their teaching rights
Special education teachers who educate children with special needs are no exception to infringements of teaching rights. Though the recent notification and bill have struck a blow in the protection of teachers’ rights, there are no specific and coherent guidelines for special educators.
James Chung, policy director of the Korean Association for Special Education (KASE) which was established in 1962 to secure the rights of special educators and develop special education, explained that special educators go through more hardships, as they have to give individual guidance to students with different characteristics.
Moreover, Chung described it is common to see cases where the damage of students turns into an act of abuse by a teacher in the process of teachersmediating students’ problematic behavior.
“This proves that the trust relationship between special educators and parents is not as good as before,” Chung remarked. “Nevertheless, special educators today are doing their best despite various forms of difficulty.”
One teacher, who requested to be referred to as JSY, also expressed teachers’ high risk of being exposed to student backlash and violent behavior in the process of guiding or controlling students, which makes them suffer physical or emotional trauma and complaints from students’ parents regarding the blurry line of legitimate guidance.
J has a younger brother with Down syndrome, which inspired her to learn more about children with disabilities and pursue her study in special education at graduate school. After volunteering for children with special needs at Seoul National University Hospital, she admired how pure-hearted the children were and decided to become a special educator. Currently, she teaches children with special needs one-on-one through home visits. However, she revealed that it is difficult to control students’ behavior, and infringements to teaching rights sometimes occur.
As for the recent legal changes, J expressed her disappointment that the lack of guidelines for special education seems to mean that children with special needs are still only handled under the discretion of special educators.
Chung finds the admission of sufficient discretion and leadership for special educators’ legitimate educational activities most crucial; thus, guidelines specifying definite behavior intervention methods should be contained in the Act on Special Education for Persons with Disabilities. And above all, protecting the right and educational activities of special educators and raising morale for them are most vitally and urgently needed.
Similar to Chung, J believes that legal and institutional improvement must come first to protect the teaching rights and ensure a better environment in special education. She emphasized the preparation of separate guidelines for special educators in the notification and bills, such as guidance methods considering the characteristics of students with special needs, clear regulations on teachers’ right regarding problematic behavior, and a quick fair-measures system against the violation of teaching rights.
“Special educators play an important role in guiding students with special needs to live confidently as members of our society,” J said. “Therefore, I hope that efforts will continue to be made to protect the teaching rights of special educators and create a comfortable environment where we can demonstrate our expertise.”
Meanwhile, Chung believes that in the educational field, whether it is special or general education, all related subjects have a responsibility to create a happy community together. Unfortunately, trust in this field has been broken and conflicts are existing these days, which make it difficult for the integrated education that special education aims to be settled early.
“Education authorities, educators, educational institutions, and parents should all join forces for the right education,” Chung said. “Like the African proverb says, ‘It takes a village to raise a child.’”