Minister Choi Kyo-jin Says Government Considering Direct Management of University Admissions Application System

[Financial News]  

The Ministry of Education is considering having the ministry or the Korean Council for University Education (KCUE) directly manage the university admissions application submission system, which has been entrusted to private companies, following an outage in the 2027 academic year’s early admissions application system.
Minister of Education Choi Kyo-jin said on the 14th, "Given that this unexpected and unfortunate incident occurred, we will actively consider the matter." University admissions applications are currently handled by private companies such as UWAY APPLY and Jinhak, which sign individual contracts with universities.
Choi Kyo-jin gave this response during an interpellation session on education, society and culture at the National Assembly of the Republic of Korea, when People Power Party lawmaker Seo Beom-su asked whether the Ministry of Education or KCUE should directly manage the application system.
The Ministry of Education plans to conduct a comprehensive review of the application-submission systems operated by private companies such as UWAY and Jinhak and develop measures for improvement in response to the incident.
The Ministry of Education estimates that as many as approximately 1,200 applicants may have been unable to complete their applications because of the system outage.
Choi Kyo-jin said, "The system outage occurred at around 5:50 p.m., about 10 minutes before the 6 p.m. deadline," adding, "We are seeking to provide relief to those who wrote, saved or submitted applications, or attempted to make payments, and we estimate that 1,200 students were unable to complete the process during that period."
The application deadline was extended by one hour, from the original 6 p.m. deadline to 7 p.m. Choi Kyo-jin explained, "According to the manual, when an error occurs at the application deadline, the deadline must be extended in 30-minute increments by 1.2 times the duration of the outage, so it was extended until 7 p.m."
Choi Kyo-jin said he issued the final order to extend the deadline after discussing the matter with the KCUE president at the working level.
However, the Ministry of Education expects the actual number of applicants eligible for relief to be lower than 1,200. Choi Kyo-jin said, "That is the estimated number of potential applicants, but the actual number eligible for relief is expected to be much lower," adding, "We will know the exact figure after the reporting period ends."
The Ministry of Education and KCUE will accept applications for relief from the 14th through the 16th and determine eligibility based on electronic records of logins, application writing and saving, submission, and payment attempts at the time of the outage.
Applicants who were unable to apply to their intended universities because of the outage and instead applied to other universities through a different application system may also be eligible for relief if relevant records remain.
When Seo Beom-su asked, "Will applicants who gave up on their intended universities because of the system outage and used their final application for another university through Jinhak Apply also receive relief?" Choi Kyo-jin replied that he believed they would be "extremely few," but added, "If such a process is recorded in the system, they will be included among those eligible for relief."
The fact that some universities disclosed their application ratios at the original 6 p.m. deadline also emerged as an issue during the extension process. Applicants who submitted applications by 7 p.m. could check the disclosed ratios before deciding whether to apply, raising concerns about fairness compared with those who submitted earlier.
Choi Kyo-jin said, "I agree that there is such a concern," adding, "We will establish a task force led by the Director General for Higher and Lifelong Education, with KCUE also participating, and respond carefully by finding ways to ensure that applicants are not disadvantaged." He continued, "We will do our utmost to prevent harm to students, and if there is anything for which responsibility must be taken afterward, I will take responsibility as minister."

[email protected] Lee Bo-mi Reporter