Nationwide, at least 870 employees at private elementary, middle, and high schools were found to have kinship ties to foundation executives. A survey found that 5 out of 10 private school foundations had hired at least one employee with kinship ties to a board director. After the Ulsan Office of Education recently concluded that a teacher at one private foundation committed sexual violence by using such status, concerns have been raised that oversight of relatives employed by private school foundations may be lax.

According to data the office of Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Jeong Eul-ho received from the Ministry of Education on the 27th, 955 employees nationwide at private elementary, middle, and high school foundations had kinship ties with executives such as board chairs, directors, and auditors. Excluding duplicate counts where executives are family members such as spouses or siblings, the number of related teachers and staff is estimated at about 870. Of 865 private school foundations for elementary, middle, and high schools that pay statutory contributions, 421 (48.6%) had hired at least one employee with kinship ties to a board director, and among foundations that hired relatives, an average of 2.5 relatives were on staff.

Private school foundations hired not only relatives within the third degree, such as children and daughters-in-law of executives, but also relatives as distant as the eighth degree, including ‘the son of a sixth cousin of the father’.

At Soongil Academy in Gwangju, one child of each of six directors works at the school. Daedeok Academy employs five relatives of the board chair as staff, and the principal is a sibling of the chair. Under the current Private School Act, the parents and children of a foundation board chair may not serve as principal, but siblings may. Hongshin Academy, run by the family of People Power Party lawmaker Na Kyung-won, hired four relatives including the cousins and nephews of board chair Na Kyung-min.

Some foundations had up to 10 relatives working across their schools. Cheonil Academy in South Chungcheong Province hired 10 related employees, 9 of whom work as teachers. A school official said, “It is difficult to answer why there are so many related employees.” Guam Academy in Busan hired six relatives of the board chairchildren·nephews and nieces·wives of nephews·granddaughtersand also hired a total of nine children of its three directors as related employees. A Guam Academy official said, “Only the final report goes up to the board chair,” adding, “For education support positions such as nutritionists, we conducted open recruitment but had no applicants, so (the granddaughter of the board chair) saw the notice and applied.”

School foundations that operate both junior colleges and elementary through high schools also hired relatives of executives as teaching staff. Of 101 private institutions operating junior colleges, 49 had full-time faculty who were relatives of executives. One foundation in Masan that operates a junior college and a middle school hired nine related employees. An executive at this foundation had a spouse, the sibling of the spouse, and two children all serving as faculty members, teaching assistants, and the like. Another executive employed four relatives, including a sibling and cousins, as faculty and staff.

Having relatives on staff is not a problem in itself, but there is significant concern that oversight may be lax when misconduct occurs at schools. On the 23rd, the Ulsan Office of Education requested the dismissal of teacher B, the grandson of the elder sister of the board chair at private high school A. The office judged that B emphasized being “a relative of a private school foundation executive,” spoke to temporary teachers as if he could influence regular hiring and contract renewals, and committed sexual violence. The office also demanded heavy disciplinary action against the foundation, saying the principal, the son of the board chair, failed to supervise properly. Teacher B had been disciplined in 2017 for violating student rights.

Hiring controversies also persisted at schools. In 2023, the former board chair of Gwangju’s Doyeon Academy and others were sentenced to two years in prison for taking money from the family of a temporary teacher in exchange for the promise of a teaching position. Doyeon Academy employs the spouses of two executives as staff. Seoyeong College, a junior college run by Gwangju’s Seogang Academy, underwent a comprehensive audit by the Ministry of Education in 2023 after it changed its hiring method to employ Mr. Kim, the maternal grandson of the board chair and the son of the university president, as staff. At the time, the foundation also omitted Mr. Kim from its disclosure of related employees and executive relatives.

These schools often failed to meet their financial responsibilities, with low payment ratios for statutory contributions. Cheonil Academy (10), Guam Academy (9), Gwangyeong Academy (7), Soongil Academy (6), and Jeonghwa Academy (5) all had statutory contribution rates below 10% in 2024. Cheonseong Middle School of Cheonil Academy paid 5,800,000 KRW out of 187,300,000 KRW (3.1%), and Cheonan Commercial High School paid 16,580,000 KRW out of 414,080,000 KRW (4%). Middle·high schools operated by Guam Academy had payment rates of only 1.5% each, and schools of Seoul’s Gwangyeong Academy were also below 3%.

The Private School Act requires foundations to disclose on their websites any employees who have kinship ties to executives, but categorizations differ by school. It is difficult to verify whether related employees are teachers or staff, and some foundations disclosed information not on school websites but on Naver Cafes. A Ministry of Education official said, “About 1% of employees at private elementary, middle, and high school foundations nationwide have kinship ties to board directors,” adding, “The Private School Act does not restrict the hiring of relatives, and whether sanctions are needed requires review.”

Jeong Eul-ho said, “Repeated hiring irregularities at private schools are not unrelated to structural problems such as family-run foundations,” adding, “We must enhance transparency in the operation of private schools and srengthen substantive oversight.”