Central to improving the quality of education is developing a teacher evaluation system that promotes teachers’ professional growth, the improvement of student learning, and educational equality for all students regardless of social factors such as socio-economic status, educational environment, race, and gender. To address these issues in South Korea and to respond to pressure from parents, educators, and policymakers, a new national teacher evaluation system was implemented in 2011. This paper briefly describes the evolution of the teacher evaluation system in South Korea and analyzes the newly developed mechanism by which teachers are evaluated. The new evaluation system resulted in a backlash from teachers and debate among educational stakeholders, including parents, educators, and policymakers. Both the support of and opposition to the new policy are discussed. Although the new evaluation system has not been viewed as effective in all schools, several cases of schools that have had success under the new system are examined to determine the factors that led to their success. This article argues that the teacher evaluation system consisting of fair and reliable components that measure teachers’ performance and support professional development can be an effective means of ensuring high-quality teaching, which, in turn, can positively impact student achievement. However, based on an examination of the case studies presented and grounded in the theoretical perspective on accountability proposed by Thorn and Harris, this study asserts that for the evaluation system to be successful in each school, accountability, necessary modification, and mutual adaptation are required. Implications for policymakers, researchers, and politicians are provided.
As local governments around the world struggle to finance and deliver quality education under fiscal constraints, pressures mount to increase efficiency and productivity in order to obtain more output from the same or fewer resources. Focusing on the case of Korea, this study investigates the productivity of outputs in local offices of education (OEs) through the analysis of personnel and financial factors by year (2012–2016). Overall, the results indicate the efficient operation of the OEs in Korea. The Malmquist productivity index (MPI) mean decreased from 2012 to 2014, increased from 2014 to 2015, and decreased from 2015 to 2016. The rate of chronological change in each OE’s MPI showed the same pattern of change in the distribution ratio of school expenditures. Finally, the MPI had the same pattern as the Technical Change Index. Policy implications are provided.
Governments around the world have invested a great deal of time and energy to reform their administrative structures for increasing public officials' efficiency in internal affairs and improving citizens' satisfaction on public service. The literature on government reorganization, consisting mostly of in-depth case studies on the influential factors of government reorganization through a small-N sample of countries, has contributed to understanding the essence of government reorganization. This study raises its limitations and the necessity of follow-up studies examining the influential factors of demands and needs for government reorganization for diagnosis and prediction purposes through a large-N sample of individuals. In this vein, this study aims to perform logistic analysis to investigate the factors influencing the perceptions of survey respondents (i.e., the general public and government officials) on the need for government reorganization based on information and communications technology (ICT) in the Korean public sector. According to research findings, "possibility of conflict between security and smart work" and "urgency of responses to AI development" are associated with an increase in the perceived necessity to reorganize the ICT sector. On the other hand, "organizational amalgamation by integrating government-affiliated institutes" and "policy direction in the mobile era" are associated with a decrease in the perceived necessity to reorganize the ICT sector. These research findings suggest that scholars and practitioners need to consider multi-level factors of government reorganization when they conceive, design, adopt, and implement the restructuring of ICT-sector agencies.
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