South Korea’s education authorities will decide on Monday whether to award credit to students who wrongly marked two disputed multiple-answer questions in this year’s college entrance exam, a move that could tweak scores for thousands of students and affect the college admission process.

The Korea Institute for Curriculum and Evaluation is slated to unveil its final decision on the issue for the latest College Scholastic Aptitude Test, known here as Suneung. The focal point of the announcement will concern the two questions from biology and English language tests, which have been challenged by test-takers as having two possible answers out of five choices.

Just days after the college admission exam, a slew of complaints questioning the accuracy of the cited questions bombarded the KICE’s home page, another setback for the agency that has already been under criticism for designing “excessively easy” test questions for 2015.

If the embattled education agency confirms that both questions have two correct answers each, the overall grade will be affected as the exam is based on relative (curved) grading system that divides all test-takers into nine groups.

According to a local private institution, the average score for biology is expected to go up by 1.3 points and 4,000 test-takers will get an upgrade in their scores. The flip side of that equation is that some 3,000 students ― who either got the question right or selected one of the other three wrong choices ― will see their scores drop.

The grade change will have even more profound impact this year. Many students in the upper brackets get similar high or near-perfect scores in math, so a belated change in scores of the science-related subjects could be the deciding factor for getting admission.

Preliminary estimates have put the number of students who got the perfect scores in math and English at near 4 percent, a higher proportion than the average year.

“Even if authorities decide to accept multiple answers, it will have more influence (on college admission) than math. The potential score change (from KICE’s decision) can be the difference between a pass and fail for top-tier medical schools,” said an official from a private education institute Jongro Academy.

The score change in the English question, however, is likely to have a smaller impact, as the authorities’ decision would increase the average score for the subject by a meager 0.1 point.

The government remained mum on the exam dispute, but observers said it is likely to accept the multiple-answer option and avoid another fiasco like last year’s test marred by a fatal mistake in one question. A local appeals court recently ruled in favor of the students who took issue with a world geography question in the entrance exam held last year.

In the aftermath of the major test-related setback, several high-ranking government officials were temporarily removed from their posts. In addition, local colleges were asked to review last year’s admission process for students penalized by the flawed question and grant admission to the affected students.

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