Hundreds of thousands of them have been demonstrating for weeks to demand greater protection after a number of suicides attributed to stress
Tens of thousands of teachers demonstrated in Seoul, the capital of South Korea, on Monday to demand greater protection from the stressful situations and bullying they say they suffer from students and especially their parents. The demonstration was organized after a series of suicides among teachers, which their families and colleagues attributed partly to excessive workload and partly to complaints or verbal threats from students’ parents. Similar vigils and demonstrations in South Korea have been repeated for weeks. The government is trying to intervene somehow.
On Monday, around 150,000 teachers dressed in black gathered in a large protest in front of the National Assembly in Seoul, holding signs and listening to speeches by some of them. The demonstration was not organized by the national teachers union, but by the group “All for One,” which coordinates the demonstrations. There were similar rallies in other South Korean cities on Monday, with an estimated total of 60-70,000 people taking part.
Teachers say they feel helpless when it comes to dealing with the rowdiest students and overprotective parents who threaten to sue for disciplinary actions they consider excessive or teachers with aggressive behavior or dozens of messages on theirs Harassing smartphones. The movement emerged after the death of an elementary school teacher in southern Seoul in mid-July, but has grown since then.
The 23-year-old woman was found dead for allegedly committing suicide after expressing grave concerns about the excessive workload and complaints from her parents: According to her family, she had been verbally abused by the parents of a student they accused of her in front of, of not having done enough to prevent her son from being bullied. Since then, there have been vigils and mobilizations every weekend, culminating in a large demonstration with 200,000 people last Saturday.
Monday’s demonstration came amid other suicides and suspected suicides among teachers in the country, including a 60-year-old from Gyeonggi province who said he was under severe stress due to his parents’ complaints.
(Chung Sung Jun/Getty Images)
A primary school teacher, who preferred to name only Koh to protect his anonymity, told the Guardian that teachers are also “being bullied by parents and students and it has to stop”. Another person who asked to be referred to by her last name, Kim, says schools should be safe places, not places where teachers are abused. Another said legal measures to protect teachers were inadequate and that the government had so far taken a passive stance.
According to the World Health Organization and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, South Korea is the country with the highest number of suicide deaths among developed countries: 20 people per 100,000 inhabitants per year. According to the South Korean government, 100 teachers died by suicide between June 2018 and June 2023, 57 of whom were teaching in primary schools.
Following the protests in July and August, the government presented a few weeks ago a series of measures to strengthen the autonomy of teachers, for example by allowing them to expel students who disrupt lessons from the classroom or to give them their smartphones revoke. However, according to teachers, authorities should consider more structured interventions to limit the risk of greater stress and severity. In response to Saturday’s protests, the Education Ministry set up a working group to examine new measures to protect teachers. However, there is still no news about concrete measures.
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Where you can ask for help
If you find yourself in an emergency situation, Call 112. If you or someone you know is having suicidal thoughts, you can call the helpline at 02 2327 2327 or via the Internet from here, daily from 10 a.m. to midnight.
You can also contact the Samaritan Association 06 77208977daily from 1 p.m. to 10 p.m.
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