Parents of preschool kids in Korea are worried and angry about the irregularities of some private kindergartens. I had a talk with a student attending pre-school education and the vice president of a kindergarten in Daegu, a mother of a student attending Daegu University. The vice president of kindergarten lamented, saying that the irregularities would have been happening ever since the support of the current government existed, and now it is finally being unveiled.

  Republican Park Yong-jin of the Democratic Party revealed early this month during an inspection in parliament about thousands of accounting fraud cases involving private kindergartens. According to some private kindergarten’s stances, they are self-employess unlike national and public kindergartens and it is unreasonable for them to be inspected just because they are being partly supported by the Nuri program. The Education Ministry mentioned that they will improve transparency in private kindergartens by applying a new accounting system.

  A student majoring in Pre-education mentioned that the private kindergartens’ stance is understandable in a way, however, just applying a new accounting system would not solve the problem because corruption occur in many ways. She said that it would be better to turn private kindergartens into national and public kindergartens to reduce their corruption. She also added that the public shouldn’t be misled into thinking all private kindergartens are corrupt.

  The vice president of the kindergarten in Daegu commented about this news that “private kindergartens should use the accounting system like schools and be managed more transparently.” She saw this problem would not be as easy as it seems to solve, but has a hope if the system is upgraded and that the situation should be solved for all children’s sake.

  Days after unveiling irregularities of private kindergartens, nineteen private kindergartens said they will close as of October 30th. President Moon also commented about the issue that “if anything illegal or a situation that causes harm to children happens, the government will take strict action against the issue.”

L.L.F reporter Da-won Ryu