Private education in parallel with public education has drawn national attention and been a persistently controversial topic against the backdrop of the nation's unparalleled education fever. With the competition for seats at the nation's middle schoo... Private education in parallel with public education has drawn national attention and been a persistently controversial topic against the backdrop of the nation's unparalleled education fever. With the competition for seats at the nation's middle schools becoming tougher in the 1960s followed by the overheated zeal for private tutoring, private education has emerged as a social issue. Currently, 68.8% of Korean students receive private education for 5.7 hours weekly on average spending 17.8 trillion Won yearly, which indicates too much time and money is spent on private education. In this context, the government has enforced a range of policies to control the excessive and unnecessary private education. The title After-school Program officially adopted by the Participatory Government in 2005 underscores the policy measures intended to reduce the spending on private education, to rectify the educational inequality for the disadvantaged class, to reinforce schools' caring function, and to link schools to local communities. The After-school Program has been implemented since 2006, with extensive research following. Yet, the effects of the After-school Program as well as the extent of such effects varied with researchers. Thus, the present analyzes if the After-school Program has effectively reduced private education and how it has impacted on private education. Three questions are raised for the purpose of this study. First, will personal trait, family background and school life factors influence middle school students' engagement in private education? Second, will the After-school Program as part of the school life factor have significant effects on middle school students' engagement in private education? To answer the foregoing questions, the present study analyzes the fifth-year data about fourth graders from the Korea Children and Youth Panel Survey (KCYPS) conducted by the National Youth Policy Institute. Excluding missing data, 1,336 8thgraders (middle-school juniors) are included in the analysis as subjects. A t-test and hierarchical regression analysis are used for data analysis. Gender, school achievement and other constructs relevant to learning habits (i.e.mastery goal orientation, behavioral control and study time management) as well as the affect-related factor, or attention, are set as the personal trait factor. Parents' education, multicultural families, yearly household income, and frequency of yearly family trips are set as the family background factor. School location, achievement value, learning activities, school rules, peer relationship, and relationship with teachers are set as the school life factor. These factors are applied to the model for analysis. The results from the analysis are as below. First, as for personal traits, high achievers at school and males spend more time on private education. As for the family background factor, the subjects spend more time on private education in proportion to the yearly household income and the frequency of yearly family trips. As for the school life factor, the subjects spend more time on private education in inverse proportion to the amount of time they spend on the After-school Program. In brief, the school achievement, yearly household income, amount of time spent on After-school Program, frequency of yearly family trips and gender exert effects on middle school students' engagement in private education in the order named. Second, as for the personal trait factor, higher achievers and those who are better at study time management spend more on private education. As for the family background factor, higher income households and parents with higher educational backgrounds spend more on private education. As for the school life factor, students attending schools in the capital region and spending fewer hours on the After-school Program spend more on private education. In brief, time spent on the After-school Program, the yearly household income, school achievement, school location, parents' education, study time management and exert effects on the middle school students' monthly cost of private education in the order named. The following conclusions are drawn from the present findings. First, given the positive effects of the After-school Program on reducing the time and cost of middle school students' engagement in private education, some measures should be formulated to increase the engagement in the After-school Programs as well as to invigorate the program. The analysis sheds light on the significant effects of the time spent on program on both dependent variables, i.e. the time and cost of middle school students' engagement in private education. Particularly, the After-school Program has negative effects on the time and cost of private education among middle school students. Specifically, the longer hours the middle school students spend on the After-school Program, the less time (weekly) and money (monthly) they spend on private education. Hence, the After-school Program is an effective policy to reduce private education, which warrants policy efforts and improvements to increase students' engagement in the program. In particular, government-led measures should be taken to vitalize the program and to increase the engagement in it among middle school students whose engagement rate is lowest. Second, the After-school Program is still far from filling the gap in education between low and high income families, which suggests the former's educational opportunities need be reinforced via the After-school Program. The independent variable 'yearly household income' significantly influences both the time middle school students spend on engagement in private education and the relevant cost, while the effects of this variable outweighs those of the other variables. As part of the family background factor, yearly household income is indicative of a household's economic status. In the same vein, such variables as parents' education and the frequency of yearly family trips (including overseas trips) reflect the socio-economic status (SES) as part of the family background factor. Parents' education affects middle school students' monthly cost of private education, whilst the frequency of yearly family trips has significant effects on the time spent on the engagement in private education. This finding suggests students' family backgrounds are closely associated with the cost and time available for private education. The After-school Program is intended to address the challenges arising from the educational inequality resulting from the social polarization, and thus to implement the educational welfare by offering free courses to low-income students who cannot afford private education against their wishes. In order for the After-school Program to fulfill the roles of providing educational opportunities for the low-income class, meeting their needs for private education, and eliminating the disparity in education between socio-economic classes, it is necessary to take the initiative in developing and improving policy measures, e.g. stable government funding for the program to support the disadvantaged. Third, a systematic foundation should be laid to underpin the original intent of the After-school Program and run it in connection with local communities. The present analysis shows middle school students' monthly cost of private education is higher in the capital region, which is attributable to the fact that the private education market has developed further and the prices of private education are higher in the region in comparison to those in other regions. The inequality and disparity in educational opportunities due to regional characteristics could be addressed by the After-school Programs intended for 'closing the gap in education'. Yet, rural areas such as farming, fishing and mountain villages, and remote areas find it difficult to secure quality teachers in the face of the environmental disadvantages and the paucity of material resources. In that such regional difficulties hinder local schools from obtaining resources successfully however hard they may try, local public agencies and organizations as well as social corporations should be encouraged to join the program, which requires a systematic base to be forged with local conditions taken into account.
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