United Nations Public Service Awards Case Studies

Educational polarization due to the high cost of private afterschool study

- The high cost of private afterschool study is one of the chronic problems that Korean society has to address. About, 81 % of Korean students receive private afterschool study that cost their parents 21.06 trillion won annually (24% of Seoul City’s education-related budget of 5.2 trillion won). This means that 19.2 % of monthly household income is spent on private afterschool study.
- Studies show that student access to private afterschool study has a direct relationship with the educational background and income of their parents. For instance, the income gap between the highest and the lowest earners is 21 % among elementary school students, 38.6 % among middle school students, and 49.4% among high school students. This indicates that the higher the academic level of parents the stronger the correlation between student access to private afterschool study and household income.
Urgent need for measures to relieve the burden of costly private afterschool study for students from low-income families
- As private afterschool study has proven to be a major cause behind educational polarization, there was an urgent need to come up with measures that would allow underprivileged students from low-income, multicultural and repatriated North Korean refugee families to receive public afterschool programs that could replace private afterschool study.
Seoul City’s long-term plans to ease the burden of costly private afterschool study
- Despite the government’s continued efforts to help parents spend less on their children’s private afterschool study, more and more students have come to rely on private afterschool study, which has called for direct intervention by local governments.
- The Happy Seoul Mentoring Project was launched by Seoul City as part of its practical measures to ease the burden of expensive private afterschool study.

- In an effort to strengthen public education by preparing schools to meet the demands for private afterschool study, Seoul City came up with an innovative idea that would allow students in grades 1-12 to receive free private afterschool tutoring by teaming up with universities and the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education. In this way, afterschool enrichment programs that encompass both regular and special subjects could be provided.
Free education for students in grades 1-12
- As Korea’s only free educational enrichment program designed for students in grades 1-12, this project aimed to use college student volunteers to ultimately cut the correlation between income gap and educational achievement by providing students from low-income families with free preferential educational support.

What is the initiative about? (the solution)
A wide variety of after-school programs - The five areas include school subjects (Korean and Korean literature, English, math, etc.), learning assistance, which helps students learn school subjects (Korean, English, math, etc.) and improve their school performance, afterschool care for elementary school children (homework help and physical movement) and support for hobbies (music, art, sports, bands, computers, origami, go, etc.), school library programs (reading, essay writing, oral readings) and intra- and extra-mural activities. In addition, Seoul City runs volunteer programs in which students participate in various volunteer and fieldtrip programs under the guidance of college student volunteers and supervising school teachers. Most of the programs are based on one-on-one or small group tutoring. A total of 191,742 students in grades 1-12 in Seoul have benefited from this program - Schools can participate in this program by applying. When the project was launched in early 2009, 19,183 students from 318 schools applied in the spring semester and 25,119 students from 406 schools applied in the fall semester. In 2010, 74,947 students from 608 schools joined the project during the spring semester. The number of participating schools more than doubled in the 2010 fall semester as over 74,493 students from 700 schools are now participating in the program. Seoul City plans to expand the project to encompass all schools, including special, schools by 2014. - Seoul City has been running this program on a trial basis at a district social welfare center since the 2010 fall semester. The aim is to expand the program further to include more social welfare centers in Seoul in 2011 through aggressive promotional activities, such as publishing articles on college students’ tutoring activities. Participating schools reporting a high level of satisfaction - Seoul City has conducted a survey of the beneficiary schools and students with regards to the level of satisfaction with the volunteer tutoring program. The survey conducted during the 2010 spring semester showed that 92% of participating schools found the programs highly beneficial to students and 90% of them said that wanted to continue to participate in the project. Considering that the project is still in its infant stage, it has proven to be highly satisfactory. Participating students responded positively to the project, saying that the project helped them develop self-confidence in their ability to do well in school and find role models among the tutoring college students. Rewarding experiences for college student volunteers - According to the survey conducted in early 2010, 81% of participating college students volunteers said that the project had been a rewarding experience and that they were able to realize their potential and learn the value of sharing while helping younger students in need.

Who proposed the solution, who implemented it and who were the stakeholders?
A project first formulate by Seoul City - Seoul City formulated the project following a meeting with 20 college presidents in September 2008. At the meeting, the presidents discussed how to tackle educational polarization and costly private afterschool study and stressed the need for an educational welfare model that could contribute to local communities through collaboration between local governments and colleges. Based on these ideas, Seoul City drew a plan to launch the project. Building an organic cooperative system among the relevant bodies - We asked for a strong support from relevant organizations including Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and schools at all levels from elementary schools to colleges in order to build an organic cooperative system for effective education service. Also, workshops have been held to collect and share ideas among those who are involved in this project. - According to the plan drawn up by Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education chooses teachers from each beneficiary school to assist and supervise the college student volunteers. Colleges encourage the student volunteers by offering academic credits for their volunteer work. Seoul City plays the managing role by training and monitoring the college student volunteers. 16,349 college students working as volunteer tutors - Students attending colleges in or around Seoul are participating in the project. In the 2009 spring semester, a total of 2, 689 college students attending 54 colleges in Seoul and 58 colleges outside of Seoul joined the project and 3,096 students joined in the fall semester. In 2010, 5,103 college volunteers signed up for the project in the spring semester. As of December 2010, a total of 5,461 college students are working as volunteer tutors for students in grades 1-12 in regular and special schools in Seoul. - College students join project as unpaid volunteers. Volunteer tutors who work over 40 hours a semester are given a certificate issued by the mayor of Seoul City, as well as an opportunity to attend workshops, and participate in volunteer work overseas as incentives to encourage their continued participation. Seoul City rewards ten outstanding volunteers every year. - Planned and run by the college student volunteers, a three-day workshop is held four times a year in which the participants share their experiences and discuss various ways to develop the volunteer tutoring program. Roughly 400 volunteer students attend the workshop annually. - In particular, around 100 outstanding volunteers are selected twice a year for a 15-day volunteer assignment in developing countries, such as Mongolia and Laos. - As the participating volunteers prepare the programs with their own ideas, 98% of them are satisfied with the volunteer work and have developed a sense of achievement and pride.

Describe how and when the initiative was implemented by answering these questions
a. What were the strategies used to implement the initiative? In no more than 500 words, provide a summary of the main objectives and strategies of the initiative, how they were established and by whom.
This project aims to utilize college student volunteers for quality public education by supporting the various afterschool programs run by elementary, middle, high and special schools in Seoul. Ultimately, such will lead to a cut in the household monetary burden imposed by private afterschool study and narrow the educational gap between students in grades 1-12. To this end, Seoul City has driven the following strategies into action. <Strategy 1> Public-private collaboration for systematic afterschool programs - With the strengthening of the public educational system as a common goal, Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, colleges and schools have formed a multi-dimensional cooperative system for systematic program management and operation. - Seoul City provides students with creative and effective customized educational services that satisfy both the beneficiaries (students in grades 1-12) and the benefactors (volunteer tutors) by responding effectively to the needs of each relevant organization. <Strategy 2> Various educational programs that incorporate the special hobbies and talents of the college student volunteers - This project reaches out to a wide range of students from less privileged backgrounds by utilizing young and talented college students as volunteer tutors. - The project meets the needs of the students by incorporating the majors of the volunteer tutors in the programs so that students can receive tutoring not only for school subjects but for special areas, such as music, visual art and sports. Students have been responding enthusiastically to the project as it sparks their interest in learning in positive ways. - In addition, the project offers educational services in a liberal atmosphere as the volunteer tutors offer counseling services to younger students, regarding their career and academic goals, at the level of individual students. <Strategy 3> Active communication for sustainable development of the project - Seoul City holds meetings and workshops, in each participating college, in which volunteer tutors can freely exchange their ideas and discuss overseas volunteer work. Seoul City has reinforced the sustainability of the project as a participant-centered program by encouraging the supervising teachers and volunteer tutors’ work coordinators to suggest ideas for the future development of the project and to file complaints at the workshops. <Strategy 4> More convenience through the establishment of an online management system - Seoul City has built a user-oriented online management system to provide prompt and transparent administrative services by matching applicant schools with volunteer tutors in real time. - Seoul City has also made it possible for the volunteer tutors to have the certificates for volunteer work issued anytime, anywhere by logging on to the Seoul City homepage. -According to a survey, the volunteer tutors singled out the online management system as being the most satisfactory administrative service.

b. What were the key development and implementation steps and the chronology? No more than 500 words
Suggestion by the college presidents (at a meeting held on Sept. 12, 2008) - Seoul City held a meeting of college presidents in which it was suggested that Seoul City create an educational welfare model that would allow local colleges to cooperate with the local governments to contribute to the local communities. Basic plan for the project established (Dec. 24, 2008) - Seoul City conducted a sample survey of 378 elementary, middle and high schools in Seoul and held meetings with the presidents of 13 colleges in Seoul and college volunteer work coordinators to better understand the demand for the program. With the survey and meetings as the basis, Seoul City formulated a basic plan for the Happy Seoul Mentoring program that best reflected the needs and suggestions of the relevant organizations. Agreement for collaboration signed by Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and the Seoul Volunteer Center (Dec. 31, 2008) - With the detailed plan drawn up in December 2008, Seoul City entrusted the Seoul Volunteer Work Center to oversee the project and formed the Happy Seoul Mentoring Team, comprised of four experts, to build a management system. As the number of participating schools has increased, two additional experts joined the Happy Seoul Mentoring Team in 2010. - Seoul City, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and the Seoul Volunteer Work Center signed an agreement to share the related responsibilities and to cooperate with one another. Project presentation and training (Feb. 2009) - Seoul City gave a presentation to introduce the project to grade 1-12 students, as well as college students, and held a training session for the college student volunteer tutors and supervising teachers. Ceremony in celebration of the launch of the Happy Seoul Mentoring Team (Mar. 30, 2009) - Seoul City officially launched the Happy Seoul Mentoring Program with a launching ceremony that included the 318 beneficiary schools and 2, 689 volunteer tutors. Seoul City holds an oath ceremony every March to give volunteers a sense of belonging and pride. (The ceremony consists of oath taking and a speech by the mayor of Seoul City.) Expansion of the project to include local social welfare centers (fall semester 2010) - A group of volunteer tutors majoring in psychology have been tutoring low-income family children with ADHD at the Guro Health Support Center since the 2010 fall semester, on a trial basis. It has proven highly satisfactory. - Seoul City plans to expand the service to cover more social welfare centers so that children with ADHD, who tend to have problems adjusting to school life and often refuse to go to school, can learn in a comfortable environment. Expansion of the project to cover all schools in Seoul by 2014 - Seoul City is undertaking the expansion of the project to include all schools at all levels, including special schools, in Seoul by 2014.

c. What were the main obstacles encountered? How were they overcome? No more than 500 words
- Unlike other programs that are run by individual organizations, the Happy Seoul Mentoring Project is a collaborative program that is operated by seven organizations, including Seoul city, the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education, elementary schools to colleges, and the Seoul Volunteer Work Center. Accordingly, Seoul City has faced the daunting task of coordinating the different interests of the seven organizations and formulating an operational plan in the initial stage of the project. < Solution 1> - A MOU for systematic cooperation was signed with the participating organizations First of all, Seoul City signed an agreement with the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education and the Seoul Volunteer Work Center, the core project partners, signed a trilateral agreement for cooperation to help develop a systematic and efficient system that would establish the Happy Seoul Mentoring Project as a viable long-term afterschool program to replace costly private afterschool study. <Solution 2>- PR efforts to recruit college student volunteer tutors through various channels - Seoul City expected to experience difficulty in recruiting a large number of college student volunteer tutors due to the lack of public awareness about the project. It introduced the project to students in 54 colleges in Seoul and focused on PR activities, such as placing posters on the subway and running ads on various newspapers and portal sites. <Solution 3>- Encouraging support from elementary, middle, and high schools and parents - The city sent an official letter to the principals of some 1, 300 elementary, middle, and high schools in Seoul asking for their support for the project. It also advertised the project to the 1,100 parents who serve as monitors. In addition, the city offered outstanding school teachers the opportunity to participate in overseas volunteer work programs, after the spring or fall semester. <Solution 4> incentives are offered to recognize the efforts of the volunteer tutors In order to run the project smoothly, Seoul City had to induce as many college student volunteers as possible. While the student tutors are recruited as unpaid volunteers, outstanding volunteers who have worked for more than 40 hours a semester are provided with a certificate issued by the mayor of Seoul City, academic credits, and the opportunity to participate in a workshop, which is held four times a year.

d. What resources were used for the initiative and what were its key benefits? In no more than 500 words, specify what were the financial, technical and human resources’ costs associated with this initiative. Describe how resources were mobilized
All expenses covered by Seoul City - Seoul City’s budget, which is roughly 2.157 billion won, covers all of the expenses required for the operation of this project. Supporters behind the success of this program <Supervising teachers> - With the commitment of the supervising teachers, who are chosen by each beneficiary school for the management and support of the volunteer tutors, over 700 schools are now successfully running the Happy Seoul Mentoring program. - As a survey has shown that the attitude of the supervising teachers toward the program has a significant effect on the satisfaction levels of the volunteer tutors with their work, Seoul City also holds training sessions to help supervising teachers better understand the program and their roles. - The supervising teachers are responsible for drawing up the program plans for their own school and requesting for the dispatch of volunteer tutors on the project website. - Also, supervising teachers hold meetings with the volunteer tutors under their supervision to assist them by listening to their concerns and discussing with them the ways to improve the program. - In addition, they update the work schedules of volunteer tutors on the project website every two weeks. They also ask for replacement tutors when volunteers drop out of the program to ensure that the program is run smoothly. <College volunteer work program coordinators> - The college coordinators contribute to the success of the project by offering a place for project PR, special lectures and meetings related to the project and the distribution of project IDs and certificates to participating student volunteers. - Some colleges provide the volunteer tutors with computers and other necessary supplies for their overseas volunteer work and hold various events for tutors and tutees. <Tutor Club “Gruteogi”> Designed to effectively manage volunteer tutors, this tutor club consists of the representatives and vice-representatives of the participating colleges. Its members (62 as of the 2010 fall semester) are categorized into four teams: the planning team, which is in charge of planning and supporting various workshops, presentations and events; the meeting coordination team, which plans and distributes meetings and common programs; the PR team, which is in charge of giving presentations at each school and organizing PR meetings; and the community team, which operates the online and offline tutor club in each college.

Is the initiative sustainable and transferable?
A social trend that stresses the importance of educational volunteer work - Considering the social trend where college students increasingly volunteer for academic credits, the participation of college students as volunteer tutors is expected to grow. - The Happy Seoul Mentoring Project is a sustainable program as its peerless systematic management and practical operation are expected to encourage the long-term commitment of volunteer tutors. Indeed, the current generation of beneficiary students may be the college student volunteers of the future. Up-to-date management and assessment - The program is run twice a year, in the spring and fall semesters, and a team of program monitors (who receives training) consisting of Seoul City and Seoul Volunteer Work Center staff visits each beneficiary school once every semester to monitor the supervising teachers and volunteer tutors. - Also, Seoul City holds meetings with the program participants on a regular basis to enhance their satisfaction with the project and its quality by accommodating their needs and ideas. - In addition, workshops (four times a year) and meetings (twice a year) are held for the volunteer tutors so that they can share their experiences and suggest ideas for the further improvement of the project. - At the end of the year, volunteer tutors give a presentation about their experiences and those volunteers with outstanding achievements are awarded. Such meetings provide volunteers and beneficiary students with the opportunity to better understand each other and to enhance their sense of pride and belonging. Examples of successful mentoring - As the Happy Seoul Mentoring Project is unprecedented in Korea, many other cities have shown a great interest in the project. In response to a deluge of queries, Seoul City has been distributing newsletters, project reports and case studies nationwide to promote the project since 2010 when the project began to show results. Four-year plan for the future - Driven by the high satisfaction with the project among the tutees and tutors, Seoul City plans to inject 10.68 billion won (roughly USD 11.3 million) in its four-year plan to expand the project to include all schools, including special schools in Seoul by 2014.

What are the impact of your initiative and the lessons learned?
College students as friendly tutors to help younger students learn at their own pace - Tutees are now showing better academic performance when they bond with friendly college student volunteers who serve as tutors as well as counselors Volunteer work as a reward rather than a sacrifice - The Happy Seoul Mentoring Program was initially designed to provide as many students as possible from low-income families in grades 1-12 with various afterschool programs within the budget constraint. Nevertheless, it turned out that not only the tutees but also the volunteer tutors have been highly satisfied with the program. According to a survey, the volunteer tutors find this program to be an invaluable experience that has provided them with an opportunity to reflect on their lives and set their goals, appreciate the value of volunteer work, and nurture their teaching skills. Participant-oriented system for sustainability (Tutor club operation) - The tutor club, led by the representatives of the 5,000 volunteer tutors, holds a variety of events, such as workshops, presentations, and PR activities for the efficient management of the tutors. - The club also promotes communication between the program operators and volunteer tutors through its homepage, the online social networking site (CyWorld) and sends out a monthly e-newsletter. (PR planning team operation) - Volunteer tutors who are interested or talented in PR are selected to be given an opportunity to participate as reporters and photographers in publishing newsletters and other forms of publications. Support for enhancing the volunteer tutors’ competitiveness - Special lectures are held (six times a year) on various topics related to volunteer tutoring. In addition, workshops (four times a year) and meetings (twice a year) are held to share experiences and address concerns so as to assist and manage the volunteers in various ways. Active support by colleges and the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education - The Happy Seoul Mentoring Program would be impossible without the active support of colleges with many talented students and the Seoul Metropolitan Office of Education that encouraged the participation of the elementary, middle, and high schools in the project. The Happy Seoul Mentoring Project serves as an example of successful collaboration among various distinct yet related organizations.


Institution Name:		Education Equality Division, Seoul Metropolitan Government
Institution Type:		Government Agency
Contact Person:		Young Jun You
Title:		Team Leader
Telephone/ Fax:		82-2-2171-2995
Institution's / Project's Website:		82-2-2171-2989
E-mail:		pass5511@seoul.go.kr
Address:		15, Deoksugung-gil, Jung-gu, Seoul, Korea
Postal Code:		100-110
City:		Seoul
State/Province:
Country:

The Problem

Solution and Key Benefits

Actors and Stakeholders

(a) Strategies

(b) Implementation

(c) Overcoming Obstacles

(d) Use of Resources

Sustainability and Transferability

Lessons Learned

Contact Information