Exploring Parental Satisfaction with Public English Education during the COVID-19 Pandemic in South Korea

Abstract

This study explored South Korean parents’ satisfaction with public English education during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. The pandemic and its sudden educational disruption have posed unprecedented challenges for teachers, students, school administrators, and parents to ensure the continuity of quality education for all. Using a nationwide survey and semi-structured interview methods, this study examined the personal and social factors that affected parental satisfaction with emergency public English education in South Korea during the COVID-19 crisis. The survey results showed that while parental dissatisfaction was a shared psychological response across social class and gender, parents were more satisfied with in-person instruction and synchronous learning. The interviews revealed that their dissatisfaction with online, especially asynchronous learning, led to a low sense of self-efficacy over the management of children’s education and growing concerns over the English divide. This research highlights the multidimensionality of parental satisfaction in the social crisis as it involves individual responses and beliefs as well as contingent public health and educational policies.