In South Korea, a female protester made a change in the conservative education sector, a feat no burly protester with a Molotov cocktail has succeeded in achieving over several decades.

This article originally appeared on Global Voices Online, and was written by Lee Yoo Seun.

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Cha Young-ran, 28, studied for about four years for the Teacher Certification Examination, a national test required for those wanting to become educators.  Just one month before she was scheduled to take the exam there was avshocking announcement from the Ministry of Education: there was not a single job vacancy in the Korean public school system for integrated social studies and the integrated science that school year. Cha was planning to take the exam on integrated social studies and the last-minute notice meant that years of work could be rendered meaningless.

Last year, there were 32 job openings in social studies and 34 vacancies in 2008. Enraged over the inconsiderateness of the administration, Cha, dubbing herself “the Noryangjin girl” (after  the district in Seoul where institutes offering Teacher Certification exam courses are heavily concentrated), stepped up to urge the Ministry of Education to compel every education sector to notify the public of available vacancies prior to the exam.  A petition was circulated, and gained 3,500 signatures.

Images de la lettre, de la pancarte et des photos sur le blog de Cha. (Utilisées avec autorisation)

Last week, Cha staged a solo protest in front of the Education Ministry, holding a bunch of flowers and a pink placard that read “a date request for Mr. Lee” (the minister of education). Within 30 minutes, Cha, in her black suit and with her long straight hair swinging in the wind, was invited into the ministry building. Several days later, the ministry announced that notification on job vacancies six months prior to the teacher certification test had been made compulsory.

“This system is very conservative”

On the web, lavish praise was heaped upon Cha for her courageous move. Blogger Ssmile260 thanked her for standing up against the social injustice with innovative ideas.

She is the Joan of Arc of our time. She tries to make a change in an irrational system. I hope to see more Noryangjin girls in the future.

Blogger SeriousMethod, who was once in the same situation, lauded Cha for taking action in an area that no one dared to touch:

I went to a college of education and I totally understand her situation more than anyone else does. My major was English (education) and fortunately, there has always been job vacancy for English teachers, but…I always aware of the irrationality of the system, but never took any action. The education sector is very conservative place. I give her a round of applause for protesting so valiantly. I sincerely hope her to pass the teacher’s exam and become a great teacher.

“I am jealous of her passion”

Sungkyoung25 reminded others that this was a long overdue reform. Education remained the only government sector that did not give potential exam-takers prior notification on job vacancies.

Every national exam sends the prior notice on the job vacancies, except the Teacher Certification exam. They(education ministry officials) make an announcement on the teacher vacancies just one month before the exam under the excuse that they want to get the exact number of vacancies made by the retirement. This year, there was zero vacancy on the integrated social studies and the integrated science. The students who studied for a year for the exam (on that subject) would be crestfallen…What’s worse, is that there are more people who have studied not one, but two or three years, even five to six years for the exam… That is why the Noryanjin girl stepped up, because of the urgency of the matter…For the government officials, this is not a big deal. They (casually) do some paper works and make an announcement (on the job vacancy). But for those numerous people who have been waiting for the job, they feel as if they fall into a pit… (The Noryangjin girl’s move) made me feel shameful about myself. I envy her passion. She made me realized one more time the importance of taking action as an intellect.

Cha’s request for change was a demand that anyone with a social conscience could have made. However, Cha was the one who actually took action and with a zest of fresh ideas, a rare change was made in one of the most rigidly bureaucratic areas of Korean life.

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Crédits photo: Flickr CC UNC-CFC-USFK, ornellaswouldgo