[2020 National Audit] Only 0.5% of Special Admissions for Disabled Students Registered in College of Education

Selection of Over 15,000 Candidates with Registration at 70-90
Education Universities at 1.9-2.5% Level
Seoul National University and Incheon National University Selected 0 Candidates Over 3 Years

[Image source=Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Hyunju Lee] Concerns have been raised that students with disabilities are being marginalized in the admissions process for colleges of education and teacher training universities.

According to the special admissions selection status for students with special education needs at 117 colleges of education and teacher training universities, disclosed on the 24th by the office of Kang Min-jung, a member of the National Assembly's Education Committee from the Open Democratic Party, about 15,000 students are selected annually through special admissions for students with disabilities, but only 70 to 90 students actually enroll through this process.

In numerical terms, this is about 0.5 to 0.6%. Despite the existence of special admissions for students with disabilities, many institutions did not admit any students through this route. Notably, Seoul National University and Incheon National University did not admit a single student through the disability special admissions in the past three years while recruiting students for their colleges of education. Although the recruitment quota was 4, the number of admitted students was zero. Incheon National University's college of education did not have a special admissions category for students with disabilities at all.

In the case of teacher training universities, only about 1.9 to 2.3% of students enrolled through the special education needs admissions over the past three years. Although all teacher training universities implemented special admissions, they failed to fill their recruitment quotas.

Assemblywoman Kang stated, "National universities should be open to socially disadvantaged groups and take the lead in embracing them, but Seoul National University and Incheon National University had no admitted students through this process," and requested, "Please identify the causes and prepare measures to resolve this issue."