SEOUL — South Korea is tightening its approach to international education, shifting its focus from increasing student numbers to improving education quality, strengthening protections and helping foreign graduates secure employment and settle in the country.
The Education Ministry announced the new strategy on September 8 after the country exceeded its target of attracting 300,000 international students ahead of schedule, as reported by The Korea Herald.
A total of 307,464 international students were studying in South Korea this year, an increase of nearly 70 per cent from about 182,000 in 2023, according to ministry data.
The figure surpassed the government’s target under its Study Korea 300K Project, which had aimed to reach 300,000 international students annually by 2027.
The ministry said the next phase of its policy would focus on attracting and developing highly skilled international talent while addressing concerns over student protection, access to the Korean labour market and opportunities for foreign students to engage with local communities.
The ministry said some international students remain vulnerable to misleading recruitment practices, inadequate academic management and poor-quality education at certain institutions.
It also highlighted cases where universities failed to promptly refund tuition fees to students who could not enrol after their visas were rejected. Some financially troubled junior colleges have reportedly delayed refunds totalling up to 1 billion won.
To strengthen safeguards, the ministry will introduce new guidelines and pursue legislative amendments governing the recruitment and management of international students.
A survey of 8,300 international students found that 17.8 per cent considered recommendations from recruitment agencies a major factor when selecting a university.
The ministry plans to introduce a standard agreement between universities and recruitment agencies in October. The agreement will make universities more accountable for agencies involved in recruiting students overseas.
Universities and agencies will be required to provide accurate information on academic programmes, qualifications and conditions for combining study with employment, while misleading or exaggerated advertising will be prohibited.
Students must also receive information in advance about tuition refund procedures, including the method and amount of refunds.
Where admission is cancelled because a student’s visa application is rejected, universities will be required to return tuition fees directly to an account held in the student’s name.
Recruitment agencies will have to provide information requested by universities, while universities will be responsible for monitoring their agencies’ recruitment practices.
The ministry plans to seek amendments to the Higher Education Act later this year to make key provisions of the agreement legally binding and establish grounds for corrective orders when violations occur.
It will also introduce guidelines for verifying overseas academic qualifications and expand consulting and other support through the Korea Academic Recognition Information Center.
South Korea will also overhaul its International Education Quality Assurance System (IEQAS), which assesses universities’ capacity to educate and manage international students and is linked to visa screening.
Current assessments cover areas including student recruitment and management, academic and living support, language proficiency and dropout rates.
Under the existing system, universities must meet one mandatory indicator and choose six out of nine additional indicators when applying for certification.
From the fifth certification cycle, covering 2029 to 2032, indicators considered essential to international student education and management will become mandatory.
The government will also gradually raise the proportion of international students required to meet recognised Korean- or English-language proficiency standards from 40 per cent this year to 60 per cent by 2030.
University assessments will place greater emphasis on the quality of academic and student support programmes rather than simply whether such programmes exist.
Institutions found to lack basic educational conditions will face tougher restrictions.
Universities that fail institutional accreditation, as well as private universities classified as financially distressed for two consecutive years, will be placed in the lowest IEQAS category.
This would restrict visa issuance for newly admitted international students and effectively limit their ability to recruit more foreign students.
The ministry will also strengthen inspections into poor academic management and human rights violations involving international students.
The new strategy aims to address the gap between attracting international students and helping them build careers in South Korea after graduation.
Of the 14,966 international graduates eligible for employment in 2024, only 4,993 secured jobs in the country, giving an employment rate of 33.4 per cent. While this was an improvement from 21.7 per cent in 2023, the majority still did not enter the Korean workforce.
The gap was even wider among Global Korea Scholarship recipients. While 83.8 per cent said they intended to work in South Korea, only 28.3 per cent had secured employment.
From 2027, the government will publish a guide covering the country’s recruitment procedures, available occupations and workplace culture.
The Study in Korea platform, which aggregates job vacancies for foreign nationals from multiple employment services, will also provide personalised listings based on students’ preferred industries and regions.
Universities and designated education internationalisation zones will be encouraged to develop more programmes connecting international students with local communities.
The government also plans to introduce a 24-hour artificial intelligence chatbot that can provide counselling in students’ native languages and refer them to professional counsellors when necessary.
The government also intends to better align international student recruitment with labour shortages outside Seoul.
More than 60 per cent of international students who wanted to work in South Korea preferred jobs in Seoul, according to 2025 data cited by the ministry.
This highlights a mismatch between where foreign graduates want to work and where regional industries face labour shortages.
From 2027, the government will introduce certification for academic departments that demonstrate strong performance in developing international talent.
Departments offering high-quality programmes linked to regional industries and demonstrating success in helping international students find jobs and settle locally will be eligible for government funding and additional scholarship allocations.
The government also plans to increase the proportion of science and engineering students among graduate-level Global Korea Scholarship recipients from 43 per cent this year to 45 per cent in 2027.
High-performing master’s students will receive support to continue to doctoral programmes, while students with strong research records could receive additional incentives.
The government will also consider preferential visa arrangements for high-performing science and engineering scholarship recipients in cooperation with the Justice Ministry.
“We will now focus on attracting and fostering outstanding talent so that international students can use their studies and experiences in Korea to play active roles both in our society and around the world,” Education Minister Choi Kyo-jin said.
