South Korea Shuts Down, Cancels Flights Ahead of CSAT Exams

South Korea completely shut down yesterday as part of their annual tradition to allow students to focus when taking the CSAT– arguably the biggest moment of every South Korean's life.

The College Scholastic Ability Test, or CSAT, is an annual exam given to university applicants on the third Thursday of November, also known as the Suneung in South Korea. The nine-hour exam encompasses Korean, English, math, and Korean history, but they can opt into a second foreign language, classical Chinese, or one or two elective subjects. Based on these scores, the Suneung can decide an individual's potential career, income, where they live, and who they marry if they go to university.

Because of this, parents often begin preparing their children for the Suneung as young as preschool, hoping for them to get into a good university. However, the system has been blamed for years as one that promotes educational inequality, leads to increased stress and worse mental health, and discourages people from having kids because parents don't want their children to go through that situation.

South Korea, in particular, has struggled with their fertility rate in recent years– the nation is one of the fastest-aging countries in the world due to the low number of people who want to have kids.

While South Korean universities do take other factors into account, a high CSAT score is crucial for getting into a top-tier institution. Any student in at least their third year of high school or with a diploma can take the exam, and they can retake it the following year if the desired result is not achieved. Hundreds of thousands of students take the Suneung each year, making it an important day for the country.

Yesterday, the third Thursday in November, over 550,000 South Korean students arrived at testing centers to take their exams – their highest participation level since 2019 – and the entire country shut down to allow them to focus in peace.

Flights were canceled for 35 minutes as students took the listening portion of the English exam, the stock market opened late, military training came to a halt, and police were deployed to the streets to help escort late students to their testing spots. In fact, any students who run late for the test can call 112 to get a free ride in a police car or on a motorcycle to reach the center as soon as possible.

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