There are good, motivated students out there, but even they get sucked into a system that requires them to check in their sense of morality and fairness for the best possible spot in an Ivy. To be fair, my worst experience was only at Daewon, where I refused to hand in a recommendation to be held “on file” and open for the staff and student’s perusal. I simply demanded, for another student, that I simply be given the application to sign, or be allowed to fill out the online forms with the school directly (which a lot of them are doing now). It was clear I was the one making things difficult for their process; yet, it was also my conclusion that applications were being “managed” beyond the the ethical event horizon.

When I was there, I flat out refused to help “edit” students’ application essays after I got my first few, some of which were half-written (nearly in outline form) and it was clear that I was expected to generate a complete and finished version.

Such places, unfortunately, are not the place to send your children (or go to work, for that matter) if you want them to not see the worst of how money, power, and influence come together to tip scales and rig the machine of life.

Yeah, I went to Andover, where there are legacy admits, certain students with famous names who can’t seem to spell much beyond that, and your “postback” sports ringers (already-high school grads who come to the school for a single year of “finishing” as well as to pummel the other schools on the football field and in crew boats) and the like; however, the vast majority of the students come from very diverse backgrounds (even before nearly all students were getting very nearly a free ride, our minority population hovered at around 30%, and it is far higher now). The main difference, though, is the school’s commitment to developing complete human beings (our school’s motto was “non sibi,” meaning “not for self”) — the difference was that we, as students and faculty, took that pretty seriously.

Point is, if you’re not a reporter for the NYT and you ask a Daewon student whether their school is committed to fully developing them as human beings, or is even truly concerned about their welfare as thinkers or even students, they’re laugh in your face. But the arrogance and disconnectedness of the faculty from this fact is what is the most shocking.

A former director of the GLP program there asked me to ask my former school if we could develop a sister relationship, since Daewon was the “Andover of Korea.” I simply asked him, “What would I tell someone at my school they would have to gain by entering into such a relationship?” because that’s what an “exchange” is about. He realized he could think of nothing.

An exchange program? Having Andover kids put on Daewon uniforms and stay half the night studying Kaplan cram books? A daily curriculum with no sports, no real extracurricular activities, a dirt soccer “field” that doubles as a parking lot? Class rankings tipped by bribery and kickbacks? Padded transcripts?

Hmm. I dutifully wrote an email to someone at an international office of development or some such at my old school, CC-ed it to my director, and let the inevitable inertia of doing something ridiculous just let the issue resolve itself. In the end, any such “sister school” relationship would be nothing more than a notch on Daewon’s headboard, which is how that school treats pretty much everything it touches.

Bitter? Yep! Exaggerations? Totally unnecessary.

My friends at Minjok, HAFS, Myungduk, and Hanyoung, all say the same thing. A real indepth article would ask the bottom 1% how they feel about the schools and if they are satisfied with the education they received. It is definitely not all for one there like many other top schools in the USA where there is a real comraderie spirit. At Daewon, it was all illusionary since most were fighting for the same spots.

Teachers at high schools are asked to be babysitters and not disrupt the system while hakwon teachers are asked to be miracle workers and bring in additonal students and money.

I can’t argue with someone who’s actually been there!…

One of the interesting things about the NYT article is that it specifically mentions that a student’s father works on the Korean Olympic Committee. The writer failed to mention that the student’s father is the President of the Korean Olympic Committee which brings me to the point that the average Daewon student turns out to be a “developmental admit” student: that that can provide financial benefits to a school, as in the case of all of Tommy Hillfiger’s children going to Duke regardless of their average SAT score of 1600 out of 2400. Those students (developmental admits) have an enormously higher probably to go to the school that they want to go to.

When the son of the President of a chaebol came here, it was a foregone conclusion that he would go to either Yale or Harvard. He chose Yale. Nothing new there.

In a survey done by the school several years ago, one of the Korean office people told me that the average income of each family was approximately 485,000$/ year. The wealth in resources that the students’ families generate allow for the best in tutors and private educational opportunities that don’t exist for others.

Mix that with accepting the best middle school students in Korea and how could they not go to the Ivy League. If the school’s program graduates an average of less than 115 students every year and if their freshman high school SAT scores are an average of 2150 when they enter the high school that by the time they leave the school, an improvement to almost 2400 doesn’t exactly equate to a substantial education that they should be getting.

Their social lives don’t exist either and when it comes to part time jobs for their college applications, I saw too many students who used family connections to get pt and summer jobs at the Korean Supreme Court, Parliament, and the top companies in Korea. No student actually went through a competitive process to obtain the job.

And while the school does not offer AP classes, the classes are generally taught that way since the students can handle difficult material. Nothing new there also. Many schools do not offer AP or IB but run the classes that way.

So mix extremely wealthy families, developmental admit students, and a guaranteed set of As on their transcripts and you have a recipe for the best achievement. Whether they can handle the work at the colleges is a whole different story, since approximately 30% of all Korean students return before the end of a full year at a foreign university.

Gregg

The Tang official histories have accounts where the largest foreigner contingent in their universities were Sillian. They made the largest group of non-Chinese to pass the state exams. Less academic inclined Koreans went to Tang China also. Chinese histories talk about there being Sillian “wards” in most major cities. The most famous of these Sillian immigrants was Chang Bogo, who was featured in the drama “The Emperor of the Sea” (Haeshin). Chang would of never amounted to anything in Silla, which was stratified by a strict bone rank social order (as a matter of fact, it was Chang’s plan to move up in the bone rank system that would eventually get him assassinated). Japanese buddist monks would write about how trade in the Yangtze River was dominated by Silla immigrants. So much of Korea’s elite got educated in Tang (as subsequent dynasties) that over 50% of today’s Korean vocabulary are Chinese loan words (although it’s similar in English as over 40% of English words are Latin loan words brought over by the Norman Conquest).

So, today the U.S. is like Tang China of yesterday for Koreans. A place of opportunity for those with out much opportunity back home and where elites sent their children to get educated. At this rate maybe in the next 50 years 50% of Korean words will be English loan words! It’s amazing how many English words have worked their way in Korean modern vernacular even today!

First of all, the NYC article read like a propaganda piece. I bet those schools are hell. I took 8 AP courses in high school and I KNOW I didn’t have time to enjoy my teenage years. Other commentors are right. These schools have no incentive to mold intelligent, well rounded human beings, but only exam “terminators.”

About Korean (and other Asian) attitudes about academics I’m torn. I think that kind of single mindedness can be quite damaging for young people, but at the same time, some discipline, direction and focus is good for kids too. I think there needs to be a balance. How the average American family raises their high school kids is a little lax, but how the most determined Korean family does it is overboard as well.

I’ve met some of those Korean foreign students (dated a few back in the day) and they are an odd bunch. As a group, they strike me as being very unhappy and lonely. Some of them are lucky enough to have family here in the states, and those are luckier then others because they at least have extended family to go to for a nice home cooked meal and such. However, as a group, they are antisocial to begin with and they don’t readily make friends. Even most gyopos keep their distance and vice versa. It certainly doesn’t help their mental health to only socialize with other Korean fluent speakers (which would only be their circle and a minority of gyopos).