The South Korean Ministry of Education revealed this week that over 4,000 schools have shut down nationwide between 1980 and March 2025, responding to the rapid collapse of the child population in the past generation.
School enrollment in South Korea dwindled by nearly 5 million students during the same time period, according to the Korea Times, indicating that the school shutdowns are directly related to South Korea’s status as the world’s least fertile country.
“Elementary schools account for the majority of closures, with 3,674 shut down permanently, compared with 264 middle schools and 70 high schools,” the Korea Times reported. “Over the past five years alone, 158 schools have closed, and an additional 107 schools are projected to shut down over the next five years.”
The newspaper went on to note that studies by Korean government-linked experts indicated that the number of schools is expected to continue to fall through the end of the decade, educating over 800,000 fewer students in the next five years.
The newspaper, citing the Ministry of Education, identified the catastrophically low birth rate as the “chief reason” the school system is shrinking.
The remaining students, Education Ministry officials noted on Tuesday, are also struggling to stay in schools and, in many cases, to stay alive amid a wave of mental health and suicide cases. The Ministry revealed that it had documented 221 teen suicides in 2024, over 100 more than in 2021, over half of them in the greater Seoul area. The government of leftist President Lee Jae-Myung is treating the situation like an emergency, announcing plans to hire large numbers of mental health professionals for schools by 2030, expand counseling and hotline services to ensure 24-hour availability, and implement other measures.