Starting this year, the application you fill out to take state service examinations will not have any place to write your educational background. That is a welcome development because it means the government is leading the way in fighting the major social ill that is the use and abuse of school connections.
It is the Civil Service Commission that has decided to get rid of the space for "education" on state service examinations such as the state public service administration and foreign service exams, in order to make sure it is not even possible for educational level and alma mater to be of any influence in whether a person passes. It has also decided to not demand documentation relating to academic performance, including grades, ahead of the oral phase of state service examinations.
It has been a long time since the government got rid of minimum education levels for people taking state service examinations, but educational background has still carried a lot of weight during the oral interview. This latest decision, therefore, is significant not only in a symbolic sense; it can be expected to have a substantial effect. There are state corporations that have already stopped asking about educational background on hiring tests, but now the range of places that do the same will grow if other state corporations and local governments participate as a result of this latest move by the Civil Service Commission.
With the exception of an extremely small number of students from a few top schools, most students preparing for their first jobs face open educational discrimination in the hiring process. There are many instances where people aren't even given the opportunity to sit for certain tests just because the academic brand name they're wearing aren't shiny enough. How can our society have a bright future if you are judged based on social prejudices about your school connections and not by your personal skills and abilities? School cliques and school background hurt independence, balance, and even efficiency. That is why the National Human Rights Commission issued a formal recommendation about abolishing the practice of setting a minimum of education and an age limit for hiring, saying that it infringes on equal rights and violates the Hiring Equality Law's anti-discrimination clause.
Getting rid of the space titled "educational background" on various job-related applications won't by itself be enough to resolve the firmly rooted structural problem that is academic cliquism. More fundamentally there needs to be a temporary quota system, a breaking down of the university ranking system, and the scholastic aptitude test for university entrance needs to be replaced by a qualification test. The disuse of "education background" sections on application forms needs to spread to private companies and the rest of society, so that society becomes a place where one competes based one's personal worth and ability without facing prejudice about one's educational background.
The Hankyoreh, 17 January 2005.
[Translations by Seoul Selection (PMS)]
[Editorial] All Employers Shouldn't Require 'Educational Background' |
