Despite an official ban on private education, North Korea’s tutoring market is expanding, with a particular focus on learning English, according to a survey conducted by South Korea’s Unification Ministry. Among individuals who escaped North Korea before the year 2000, only 3.2 per cent had taken private classes, while the percentage of defectors who received private education surged among those who came to South Korea after 2011. Of those who defected from North Korea between 2011 and 2015, and between 2016 and 2022, 13.2 per cent and 14.1 per cent had received private tutoring, respectively. The ministry surveyed 6,348 North Korean defectors who left their home country by 2020 and resettled in South Korea. A separate survey conducted on 287 North Korean defectors who escaped the country between 2006 and 2020 and who had received private education revealed substantial expansions in the realm of private English tutoring.
Traditionally, mathematics and arts have held significant importance in North Korea, leading to many students pursuing private education in these subjects. However, more students are enrolling in private English classes, a senior official from the Unification Ministry, who opted to remain anonymous, explained during a closed-door briefing. The percentage of individuals taking private English lessons has increased from 12.5 per cent between 2006 and 2010, to 17.1 per cent between 2011 and 2015, to 27.7 per cent between 2016 and 2020, according to the survey. The percentage of individuals receiving private tutoring in the field of arts experienced fluctuations, with rates of 35, 39, and 33.8 per cent during the same period, respectively. But mathematics continues to hold the highest importance, as 37.5, 47.9, and 47.7 per cent of respondents respectively answered that they had received private mathematics tutoring over the same time frame. Another noteworthy trend in North Korea is that the number of full-time private tutors has grown in recent years.
