This article highlights the problems with public education and the need to address social disparities in education through my experiences with the education volunteer organization Bannasar and the potential I see in underprivileged students. To achieve equality of educational opportunity, she argues that volunteerism and changes in the public education system are needed together, and that these small changes can become an “educational ladder” that can reduce inherited educational disparities and allow individuals to build their future through their own efforts.
I have been volunteering with a service organization called People Sharing Learning for a year and four months since last summer. It has provided me with a great learning opportunity and reminds me of the value of social responsibility and service every week. People Sharing Learning, or Bannasa for short, is an organization that provides educational services to underprivileged children and is the largest educational volunteer organization in Korea, with more than 250 students and 400 volunteers. With a diverse group of children and a large number of dedicated volunteers, the organization plays an important role in opening up new possibilities for students who have been marginalized from educational opportunities. The organization primarily aims to teach students from underprivileged areas of society, and while some students come to the organization voluntarily, others are referred by local governments or given up on by schools. The reason for this introduction is to tell you about my experience with the organization and what I learned from it.
This semester, we had a student in our class who stood out because he was a member of an athletic team until the first semester of his sophomore year, when an unfortunate accident forced him to give up sports, and he had done very little studying. Her parents had supported her to focus on her athletic endeavors, but the sudden accident changed all of her plans. With this change in his life, he was faced with the challenge of studying like never before, and his grades naturally dropped, and his motivation to study decreased. When it came time to prepare for exams, he would often just cram questions, and rarely felt like he had done the work or felt a sense of accomplishment.
But as we continued to teach, I realized that he had great potential. At first, he was negative about studying, but as I explained the basics to him, he gradually gained confidence. In the units that were based on the previous content, he would often just take the answers, but when he understood the new content and challenged himself with the problems, his performance was unexpected. In the sections where she could only solve problems based on the material she had learned that day, she showed excellent application and computational skills. His athletic focus and strong mental strength supported him, and I could see his grades gradually improving. So I know I’m teaching him enough of the fundamentals he needs. I’m also adding another hour of activity each week to help him get back to the basics. He is still at a very basic level, but I believe that with his passion and hard work, he has a lot of potential to grow in the future.
Teaching at BANASA has opened up new perspectives for me as well. I’m always amazed that students who are at the bottom of their class and are labeled as ‘underachievers’ show so much promise when taught the basics. It makes me think that there are so many students out there with potential, but they just don’t get the chance and limit themselves. When I see students gradually improve their grades and become more interested in their studies, I realize the importance of providing equal opportunities in education. It’s a long and slow process, but in the end, they learn how to learn for themselves and feel a sense of accomplishment. It’s not just about getting better grades, it’s about personal growth and realizing the power of learning.
So why do these students end up in “inferior classes” at school, and why do they give up on their studies? I believe the answer lies in the social structure and inherited educational inequality. The secondary school curriculum in Korea is actually not very complex. Rather than requiring difficult math or a high level of understanding, the curriculum is simple enough that students can follow along without much difficulty as long as they have the basic understanding and rules. Especially in math and science, you just need to learn the basic principles, and you can achieve results with individual effort and a little help. However, the current education system tends to categorize students based on prior learning and accept differences in performance as a natural consequence.
The key issue here is the way public education is assessed. Most public schools segregate students based on their current grades, which leads to disparities in educational opportunities based on family economic status. Students from more affluent families are placed in honors classes and have more educational opportunities due to prior learning. On the other hand, students from underprivileged backgrounds are more likely to fall behind early on, which can gradually intensify and eventually make a huge difference in their academic performance. As a result, the phenomenon of underprivileged students falling behind because they don’t get a head start is not just an “academic gap,” but a social inequality that is passed down through generations. In fact, if you look at the enrollment rate of SKY University, a prestigious university, high schools in certain neighborhoods, such as Gangnam-gu, have a much higher enrollment rate than other neighborhoods. In addition, statistics that show that the wages of children whose parents are college graduates and high school graduates differ by up to 24.4% even if their SAT scores are the same illustrate the reality of current educational inequality.
To break this stratification, I see the need for an “education ladder”. An educational ladder is a platform for individuals to move up the ladder through hard work and determination. I believe that we should be a society where dreams can be realized through individual effort and achievement, not based on parental wealth or private education. To achieve this, we need to apply school-centered evaluation methods within public education to eliminate the need for private education, and educational service organizations such as BANASA should be able to provide supplementary help to students who cannot afford private education. If this is done, it will reduce the stratification of society and provide a level playing field.
The “educational ladder” I’m talking about is all about realizing the equality of opportunity that welfare societies talk about through education. It’s not just about improving grades, it’s an inherent effort to reduce social disparities. Educational services such as Bannassa serve as rungs on this ladder and are a great example of filling the gap in private education. Of course, institutional change is not easy, but I believe that if we keep trying to make small changes, they can eventually lead to big changes.
I was able to enter a science high school thanks to the preparation I received at a cram school in junior high school, and it was relatively easy for me to enter university. I received many benefits from society through this process, and now I am involved in volunteer activities in the hope that I can help in a small way. My experience at Bannasar has been a great learning experience for me, and I hope to continue to climb the ladder through volunteering.
