Understanding the Importance of English Education in South Korea and Exploring the Reasons Why South Korean Students Come to a University in the Midwest

Rank of the Quality of English Education in Korea 

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English speaking skills were not great, and I was so sad and disappointed that 
English education in Korea definitely needs to become more practical.   
 
Furthermore, the majority of the 30 Korean students described that they used 
numerous English materials and workbooks to intentionally achieve the top score on the 
English part of the annual university entrance test and TOEIC or TOEFL to get a nice job.  
Nine out of 30 Korean students said that there are 2 reasons for them to study English 
continuously: first, they wanted to enter the best Korean universities, such as Seoul 
National University, Korea University, and Yensei University when they were high school 
students; second, before they graduate colleges or universities in Korea, they would like 
to obtain jobs at the best companies, such as Samsung, LG, and Hyundai.  One of the 
9 Korean students, Michael, mentioned: 
Many English teachers in Korea specifically teach Korean students how to answer 
English questions quickly and to achieve a high score on TOEIC and TOEFL in a 
short period.  In other words, these teachers always taught me unique test 
techniques to find appropriate answers of English questions right away.  So, I 
never had a chance to learn genuine and practical English when I attended the 
public high schools and the private institutes.  
 
Three out of 30 Korean students thought that the public schools and the private 
institutes did not have enough qualified native-English teachers in Korea.  In other words, 
Korean students have a limited chance to learn practical and real English with qualified 
native-English teachers.  One of the 3 Korean students, Daniel, stated: 
There are many Korean students in the public schools and the private institutes, 
but there are only a few native-English teachers in the public schools and the 
private institutes.  I could understand that it is difficult for the public schools and 
the private institutes to bring in qualified native-English teachers under the 
limited budget of hiring this kind of English teacher, so I am not sure how Korean 
students could improve their English fluency, especially English speaking skills, 
without this kind of teacher in the public schools and the private institutes. 
 

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As previously stated, it seems that most of the 30 Korean students showed that 
they have not been satisfied with English education in Korea.  That is why the average 
score of English education in Korea was 5.66 out of 10. 
 
 
Figure 2.
 
Rank of the Quality of English education in America.  
 
 
These students also gave a score of English education in America as follows.  
Twelve out of 30 Korean students ranked English education in America at 9 out of 10, 
and 11 out of 30 Korean students ranked English education in America at 8 out of 10.  In 
addition, 5 out of 30 Korean students gave a score of 5 out of 10 and 2 out of 30 Korean 
students gave a score of 10 out of 10 for English education in America.  The majority of 
the 30 Korean students indicated that they really like to be exposed to an English