The "Confirmation"

The “Confirmation”

             In 2008, I entered Shinchang Middle School, my heart throbbing with expectations for the new world. But as time passed, I started to notice the reality of the Korean education system. All they valued was the concept of “uniformity.” All students had to wear exactly the same uniform with the same hair style. No exception was allowed. In the same outlook, we had to memorize the same thing for each class. Our creativity was never accepted as an appropriate response to any matter.

             Everyone looked almost the same in the green school uniforms. The only things that could differentiate the students were their unique hair styles. However, that variety was soon forced to be the same. Boys could not have their hair touching the collars. For girls, it was even harsher; we could not have it longer than 3cm from our ears. The chief teacher of the student guidance literally measured our hair with a ruler. The rule for length being this cutting, hair color other than black was unimaginable.

Naturally born with brown hair, I was always suspected of having dyed my hair. Teachers would say, “Jane, why do you have brown hair? You are supposed to be a smart model student. The one who studies hard should always have black hair.” “Smart” students should have black hair; how racist. In the first place, I wondered why they did not want to accept the natural difference of my hair color even after having me explain it for over ten times. Secondly, even if I did dye my hair, what did it really have to do with me studying hard?

Not only the school rules, but the academic quality was also frustrating. I did not learn History, but memorized twenty different types of earthen vessels. The teacher automatically skipped teaching modern Korean history, following the unspoken rule of the society which wanted to avoid telling the dirty truth of the dictator’s era. I memorized the whole English textbook, and that was all I had to do for that class. All of the English teachers recited the book without any clues, but none of them could speak a single complete sentence in English properly. Math class was rather a self studying time for solving problems in the textbook, since most of us already learned it from prep schools and the teachers were impassionate to teach it again. Korean Language class was the most demanding one for memorizing. We never had any chance to “write”. The school did not want our diversity, but uniformity even in academics. Who memorized the detail better decided who were smarter than others.

One day, I realized I could no longer be part of the community, in which students were only taught to be uniformed. The system was not an education; in my point of view, it was no more than a tool to control students from putting their interest in other matters, and to raise them to be the loyal citizens of the country where rich people were the owners. Although I wanted to leave the school as soon as possible, there wasn’t any great solution. Most of the middle schools in Korea were not at all different from Shinchang. The only way to escape the situation was to have a completely different environment, such as moving to another country, but that seemed like an impossible alternative at the time. Also, I wasn’t sure whether I would perform better in a foreign country. After considering the solution for a while, I decided to use a method powerful enough to persuade both myself and the people around me. I promised myself to try my best in Shinchang for the first semester, and then to decide whether I still wanted to move out.

For that one semester, studying hard was always my priority. I wanted to figure out how I would view the school system after I became the only top student of the grade. That was when I studied harder than ever. I wrote down every single detail that came out of the teachers’ mouths and memorized it repeatedly until I would automatically murmur it unconsciously. For math, I almost mastered the whole 400-page textbook, knowing even the hardest problems that were not suggested by the teacher. I kept the routine of waking up, breakfast, studying, lunch, studying, dinner, and studying, until the final exams. Eventually, I took the first place in all of the subjects with no exceptions at all. My average score of the subjects was close to the perfect score of a hundred percent. Since I was the first one ever to receive so many perfect scores, the whole school was surprised. The principal called me to his office, saying tons of graceful wordings to praise my high academic achievement. The way everyone treated me changed in a few hours. No teacher could complain about my hair, or my anything. It was hilarious.

But I was not happy. Even after getting the first rank of the school and receiving numerous Model Students Awards, I felt hopeless. When I saw myself unconsciously reciting a novella and its fixed analysis, I was sure I wanted something different. Now that I tried my best in the given environment and earned great results, I was proud enough to “complain” about the current problems with the school. Through the process of setting a goal, accomplishing it, and doubting it again, I confirmed my decision with my effort.

I was ready to tell my parents. I just said six words exactly, “I want to study abroad.” Unlike my worries, they both agreed with my plan without any questions, for they already knew how much I disliked the reality of Korean public education. My mom suggested me going to a famous private boarding school in Boston. But I chose a small city called Champaign rather than Boston; a rather “boring” countryside city in Illinois seemed more attractive. I decided to go to a public school, expecting to share the ordinary, “free,” life of Americans.

Looking back to more than three years, I’m pretty sure I made a right decision through a self-confirming way. Though I’m not trying to promote any kind of cultural toadyism, I think leaving this country for a while and experiencing another was one of the best decisions I have ever made in my life. I learned a lot. I liked how they respected me as an individual- I automatically learned to respect others as well. I liked how they taught me something that I would remember forever without constantly forcing myself to memorize.

I’m not sure if the experience helped me to understand something faster in time, but I can guarantee one thing. Although I don’t remember the names of the different tribes which I was almost dead to memorize, I can still draw the exact structure of a human cell which I learned through making a Styrofoam model. Although I don’t even want to imagine the teacher who forced me change my natural brown color to a superficial black one, I still appreciate this one stranger who smiled at me at a local food market in Champaign. Honestly, I’m still proud of myself for making a wise decision not only based on my taste, but also based on a 6-month of personal experiment.