Study Program for North-South Korean Students and Teachers Launched
The Unification Education Research Center in Seoul National University has launched a school for teachers and students from the entire Korean peninsula. The program, which starts today, will run for three months and the classes are on alternate Saturdays. The lessons include Korean, ethics, Science, Math, physical education and arts, according to Korea Times in an article last Wednesday.
One class comprises 24 fifth and sixth-grade children - 12 from each nation. There is also the same number of students for 3rd year middle school. The North and South each have two homeroom teachers. There are tutorial sessions with the students at Seoul National University as well.
The program's primary objective is to give everyone involved a glimpse of what life would be like if both Koreas are unified, allowing them to prepare when this moment finally comes. This way, students won't have difficulty adjusting to school life and their studies.
But what has made the team think this initiative will be successful? They based their decision on poll data.
In a survey conducted by the government last year, as reported by Yonhap News on Aug 27 the same year, nearly 50% of South Korean students and teachers perceived the North as an ally rather than an enemy.
With 3,130 teachers and 116,000 students from 200 schools (elementary, middle and high school) as respondents, the findings revealed that 48.8% see North Korea as a "cooperation partner." On the other hand, over 53% believed that unification between the North and South was necessary, while close to 20% thought it was unnecessary.
Seoul National University's Institute for Peace and Unification also conducted a survey on North Korean defectors. The results revealed that 55.7% of those who left in 2013 have perceived people in the South as a "cooperation partner" before leaving their nation, while 20% have considered the South as an "enemy".
"The frosty relations between the two Koreas last year, compounded by the North's propaganda condemning the South to its people, seem to have strengthened North Koreans' negative perception of their southern neighbor," according to unification professor, Kim Byeong-ro.
