Teenage Suicide in South Korea

Seoul National University, Korea University, and Yonsei University, commonly known as SKY, are the top three universities in South Korea and are the hardest to get accepted into. High school students spend the majority of their time studying for the CSAT, which is similar to the SAT and ACT in the United States. Performance on the CSAT can determine which college students get accepted into, which consequently can affect their futures. In addition, students only get one chance to take this test; retaking it is not encouraged. As a result, parents, usually mothers, begin pressuring their children at an early age. By high school, the pressure exceeds students’ limits and causes them to commit suicide. The alarmingly high teenage suicide rate in South Korea caused by academic pressure is a pressing issue that must be resolved. The CSAT, or the College Scholastic Aptitude Test, is an eight-hour-long test with five multiple choice sections. Over 650,000 students take this exam the second Thursday of November (“Point me at the SKY”). This day impacts the students’ futures, so the test takers become the main priority for Korea. Businesses open late to decrease the amount of traffic, and police officers assist students through traffic; flights are halted to minimize the noise; mothers pray in churches or temples; protestors halt their protests (“Point me at the SKY”). To prepare for this test, most students attend cram schools, or private academic institutions, which are called hakwons. The majority of students’ time is spent either at school, at hakwons, or studying. “Government data shows the average high school senior sleeps about five hours and studies more than 11 hours a day” (“Teen suicides on the rise”). The stress caused by the preparation for the exam is one of the major causes of teenage suicide. Though there are multiple reasons behind suicide, school related difficulty is the main reason. According to Human Rights Monitor-Korea, 39.2% of teenage suicides are “related to concerns about grades or school admission” (Corks). Students are especially worried about school admission because it determines how successful they will be in the future. The CSAT is also a major component that affects acceptance into colleges. Excessive amounts of stress are placed on students, which often leads to suicide. Teenage suicide rates have increased by 57% from 2001 to 2011, and South Korea has the 5th highest suicide rate in OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) countries (“Youth suicides in S. Korea”). Much can be done to reduce the amount of teenage suicide in Korea. There is a World Suicide Prevention Day on September 10th. There are also some schools that offer counseling and screenings for depression. This helps students because talking to someone about their difficulties could dissuade them from committing suicide. However, according to an education ministry official, “Very few of the students deemed at risk actually end up getting counselling because their parents are unwilling” (qtd in “Teen suicides on the rise”). Most of the pressure that students face is caused by their mothers. Mothers take matters into their own hands to make sure their children get into the best colleges. As a result, they push students to the point where they feel they need to escape all the stress. Therefore an effective solution would be for mothers to place less pressure on their children to excel. Although this may seem like a simple solution, it is not a likely one. Because there is so much competition both nationally and internationally, parents will most likely continue to push their children to be the best. Another possible solution is to place less importance on the acceptance into a prestigious college in order to get a good job, as well as less importance on the performance on the CSAT in order to get into those colleges. Although students who graduate from the SKY universities receive enormous benefits, only 2% are actually accepted every year (“Point me to the SKY”). As a result, students worry and are discouraged when they do not get in. This is also not likely to work, because, similar to the Ivy League colleges in the US, SKY universities have been around for a long time, and the prestige placed on them is not likely to disappear quickly. Teenage suicide in South Korea is an ongoing problem that must be solved. A large percentage of these suicides originate from academic pressure and anxiety over school grades and college admission. Students receive excessive amounts of stress while studying for the CSAT, the nationwide exam that determines their futures. This stress, along with the concern over the extreme selectiveness of prestigious colleges, causes South Korean teenagers to end up taking their own lives in order to escape. One possible and realistic solution is counseling students in schools to treat possible depression. Other possible but unlikely solutions are convincing parents to put less pressure on their students and placing less prestige on the top colleges and the CSAT. If South Korea were to utilize these methods, they would likely witness a definite decline in the teenage suicide rate.