Ministry of Education Survey Shows 88% of Medical Students "Willing to Return to Classes"

7,673 Students from 24 Universities Including Yonsei Responded to Survey
Approval Rate for Returning Highest Among Second-Year Pre-Med and Third-Year Medical Students

Photo taken on the 27th at a medical school in downtown Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News

Amid ongoing class boycotts by many medical students protesting the government's plan to increase medical school admissions, it has been found that more than half of the students are willing to return to their studies.

On April 29, the Ministry of Education and the Korean Association of Medical Colleges (KAMC)?a gathering of deans from medical schools nationwide?announced the results of a survey conducted among 11,889 students from 24 universities, including Yonsei University. Of these, 7,673 students responded to the survey, and 6,742 of them expressed willingness to return. This represents 87.9% of respondents. When calculated as a proportion of all students surveyed, the return approval rate stands at 56.7%.

Among 13 medical schools where the survey was broken down by academic year, second-year pre-medical students and third-year medical students had the highest approval rate for returning at 51.1%. This was followed by second-year medical students at 49.4%, and first-year pre-medical students from the class of 2025 (freshmen) at 49.3%. The class of 2024, who became first-year pre-medical students again this year after taking a collective leave of absence in February last year to protest the government’s plan, showed the lowest approval rate at 45.7%.

Provided by the Ministry of Education

The Ministry of Education stated, "Recently, there has been a significant increase in support for returning among medical student communities," and added, "This survey has confirmed that the sentiment toward returning is indeed changing." The Ministry also reported that in a survey conducted on 'MediStaff,' a community for medical students and doctors, regarding whether to return before April 30 (with 94 respondents), 51% answered they would return, surpassing the 37% who said they would not.

In a separate survey (with 71 respondents) asking about the relationship between the abolition of the essential medical package?a demand from medical student groups?and returning to class, 73% said they would return if the Ministry of Education provided relief, which was 2.7 times higher than the 27% who said they would continue to boycott classes, according to the Ministry.