The Ministry of Education on Thursday unveiled its policy to revamp the education system to better accommodate multicultural families.

In the 2015 policy briefing session by six ministries at the presidential office, the Education Ministry said it would establish kindergarten courses for multicultural children in 30 educational institutes. It will also expand the number of preparatory schools ― operated for children of migrant families having difficulty with regular school curriculums ― from 80 to 100.

In its briefing, the Ministry of Gender Equality and Family said that it would work to preserve the culture of the children’s native countries, by encouraging them to learn their own mother tongues. According to the ministry, 76.1 percent of children whose parents are from North America or Europe learn the native language of their parents, but only 3.1 percent and 17.1 percent of the children with Cambodian and Vietnamese roots do the same.

Last year’s data from Statistics Korea showed that 8.3 percent of all marriages in 2013 were interethnic marriages. But another report by the National Human Rights Commission showed that 41.3 percent of multicultural children do not have a Korean friend, indicating that ethnic Koreans show little tolerance for migrant families

The government will introduce an online education system that will help ethnic Koreans better understand their neighbors from different ethnic groups. Officials will finalize the education content by August and will kick off pilot programs in September.

As regards education reforms, the Education Ministry reiterating its intention to expand the “free semester” ― a no-test semester that provides job-related experience for first-year middle school students ― to 70 percent of all middle schools, up from 25 percent in 2014.

The ministry will also push for enacting a bill that will mandate government and state-run bodies to provide programs for students. A pan-government committee on creating such programs will be established, and a separate bureau-level team dealing exclusively with policy will be created within the ministry.

But the briefing left out any mention of the free high school education policy, one of President Park’s election pledges.

“Free high school education has been put off for this year, and will be discussed next year. But the policy is not being discarded, just postponed” said Education Minister Hwang Woo-yea.

By Yoon Min-sik (minsikyoon@heraldcorp.com)