Shadow Education in the Southeast of South Korea: Mothers’ Experiences and Perspectives of Shadow Education

Shadow education in the southeast of South Korea: Mothers’ experiences and perspectives of shadow education A DISSERTATION SUBMITTED TO THE FACULTY OF THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA BY Soo Kyoung Lee IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY Gerald Fry August 2014 © Soo Kyoung Lee, August 2014 Acknowledgements This dissertation research project is completed with all the support that I received from faculty, colleagues and friends whom I met in the past six years of my PhD program. First, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Gerald Fry, for his unconditional support and care throughout my entire journey of this academic program. I am grateful for his cheerful spirit and helpful advice on all matters that influenced my life during the past six years. I am also thankful to Dr. Frances Vavrus, and Dr. Peter Demerath for providing helpful feedback on this dissertation research. Their continuous feedback challenged me to think deeper and kept me being inspired and engaged. Special thanks must go to Dr. Nancy Abelmann in the University of Illinois for being in the dissertation committee. I was touched by her passion for research and her commitment to advising doctoral students. I have benefited from her insights and scholarship in creating and completing this research. I have met great supervisors in the University of Minnesota who had influenced me to grow further as a professional researcher. I am especially thankful for Dr. Joan Dejaeghere for having me as her research assistant and showing me a great example of a research scholar. I have the most memorable research experiences with her and those experiences shaped me as an international educator and researcher. I must say thank you to Dr. Alisa Eland and Beth Isensee in the International Student and Scholar Services for their support during my last year of the program. I am thankful for their generosity with their time and professional advice. i My gratitude extends to my great colleagues and friends, Maren Stoddard Mack, Lucy Hardaker, Nicole Clements, Pamela Geisser, and Kangting Ji. I was greatly helped by them and their assistance and hospitality are with me wherever I will be next. Many thanks go to my amazing CIDE friends; Casey Stafford, Amanda Sanchez, Christiana Kwauk, Li Yang, Somongkol Teng, Ya Lui, Seongdok Kim and Yeeun Shin. I learned so much from these friends how to balance life and work and my graduate student life was full of exciting moments with them. Special thanks are with Maren Stoddard Mack, Nicole Clements, Casey Stafford and Christina Kwauk for providing me with their generous feedback on my initial scripts of this dissertation study. I had the privilege to have many great mentors in the different stages of my PhD program. I am grateful to Diana Yefanova for mentoring me in my first year. I was comforted by her kindness and compassion when I had many questions about the program and graduate student life. I had received helpful advice many times from Soo-Yong Byun, Kyoung-Ah Nam and Jae-Eun Jon in the middle of the program. I thank them for their listening ears and making the time to counsel me what to consider for dissertation writing and career planning. Noro Andriamanalina and Nasreen Mohamed mentored me for my professional development at the end of the program. I was inspired by their mentorship and leadership. Finally, my sincere gratitude goes to my parents, Deok-Hee Lee and Sun- Ryeon, my brother, Dong-Hyun Lee, in South Korea and my aunt, In-Sook Lee, and uncle, Sang-Kuk Lee in Colorado. I am truly blessed with their love and generosity. It was not possible for me to complete this dissertation without their support. ii Abstract This study examines mothers’ experiences and perspectives of shadow education in the southeast regions of South Korea, Daegu and Changwon, in the multiple layered sociocultural and historical context of its society. When I was immersed in the mothers’ world in those selected regions of South Korea in 2011 and 2012, expenditures on shadow education decreased for the first time. While there was still high demand for shadow education in order to secure “the foothold for better life opportunity”, mothers I came across in the selected regions showed ambivalence about the prevalent pervasive shadow education. To fill the gap of literature on Korean shadow education, this study looked at mothers’ motives for their children’s shadow education and perceptions of social changes including education and family involvement. Their lived experiences and ambivalent feelings toward shadow education were scrutinized in order to understand the Korean shadow education phenomenon from the mothers’ viewpoint. The study found that mothers’ perspectives on shadow education practices were extremely complex. It is argued that mothers’ pursuit of shadow education has been their way to adapt to the rapidly changing education and society. The mother participants perceived their role in their children’s education as being most critical and their ways to be involved in their children’s education were ever changing. The gendered practice of providing shadow education to children was changed from the image of ‘mothers watching from behind’ to the image of ‘mothers suggesting ways in front’. What remains the same is, however, the strong connection between prestigious universities and desired occupations. Academic learning was still foundation of all endeavors for school aged children. The complexity of mothers’ iii experiences of shadow education is also found in their ambivalence towards this prevalent phenomenon. Knowing the mothers’ ambivalence and concern about educational migration, mothers wished to live in a society where true learning can take place for their children. Unique contributions of this study are to understand mothers’ experiences and perceptions of Korean shadow education outside of the capital, Seoul, and mothers’ perceptions of the different genres of shadow education. Mothers in the selected regions in the southeast of Korea, Daegu and Changwon, viewed mothers in Seoul as more demanding and motivated to provide shadow education and they legitimized some of their actions of providing extraordinary amounts of shadow education. Their viewpoints of educational environment in different places also went beyond the national border. Seeking a different educational environment abroad was, however, found only in several upper-middle class families who could afford such education. Stratified shadow education also suggests the role of shadow education in reproducing social class through education. Lastly, this study calls for further studies of transnational shadow education through educational migration and other family members’ experiences and perspectives of the shadow education phenomenon. iv Table of Contents Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................. i Abstract .................................................................................................................................. iii Table of Contents.................................................................................................................... v List of Tables ........................................................................................................................ viii List of Figures ........................................................................................................................ ix Chapter 1: Introduction ........................................................................................................ 1 Context ofStudy .................................................................................................................... 1 Problem Statement ............................................................................................................... 4 Purpose of Study .................................................................................................................. 5 Research Questions .............................................................................................................. 6 Significance .......................................................................................................................... 6 Terminology ......................................................................................................................... 8 Limitations ......................................................................................................................... 10 Chapter Outline ................................................................................................................. 10 Chapter 2: Literature Review ............................................................................................. 12 Conceptual Framework...................................................................................................... 12 Korean Development .......................................................................................................... 16 Formal and Shadow Education Development ................................................................ 16 Explanations for the Growth of Shadow Education ....................................................... 17 The Dilemma of Korean Shadow Education ................................................................. 22 Neo-liberal Globalization and Korean Shadow Education ..............................................

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