[Opinion] Two Types of Teachers

“Isn’t it the duty of teachers to help out their students?” asked teachers of Seoul Myunmok High School, who all collected little sums of money to provide scholarships to their students.

The teachers created the scholarship fund in 1997, when times were difficult due to the economic crisis, because they felt sorrowful to see poor students. It is amazing for a scholarship fund to continue for 10 years in a public school, where teachers often move, but their words of “it is a teacher’s duty” carry an even greater meaning.

Seoul National University emeritus professor Ahn Byung-jik is even providing “after service” as part of his duty as a teacher. In the young days when he believed in socialism, he recommended his students to read Marx and Mao Tse-tung and engage in worker rights activism. Nevertheless, capitalism continued to develop even after the collapse of the Park Chung-hee regime. After undergoing through purgatory anguish, he converted into a rightist, but more than a few of his students were still leftist activists. He said, “I would support them if they had chances to succeed, but I tried to persuade them to abandon the socialism because I felt that they would just perish otherwise.”

Two famous students who were convinced are Text Forum Co-president and Seoul National University Professor Lee Young-hoon, and Gyeonggi Province Governor candidate, Representative Kim Moon-soo.

Another teacher that roamed the 70s and 80s is former Hanyang University professor Rhee Young-hee. The paper he wrote titled “Logic in an Era of Transition,” in times when China was still behind a bamboo curtain, contained various errors. Liberty Union Steering Committee member Choi Hong-jae commented, “The cultural revolution taught by Professor Rhee, has even been denied by the Chinese communist party, and is considered a blunder by the Chinese people.” However, Rhee published another book last year titled “Dialogue,” criticizing the Korean government’s dependency on the U.S. and highly praising the self-autonomy of North Korea. In other words, he still is raising anti-American pro-North Korean students.

There are teachers who are beneficial to students, and teachers who are harmful to students. A student who received a scholarship from the Myunmok Scholarship Fund said, “I want to become a teacher and spread more love than I have received.” I just wish that, unlike such students, students having only learned anger and hatred from teachers who do not fulfill their duties do not harm Korea’s future with that negative energy.

Kim Sun-deok, Editorial Writer, yuri@donga.com