Scenes from the era of "test first, apply later": High scorers on the Academic Achievement Test still concentrate on Seoul National University

During the era of the 'Academic Achievement Test,' which was the center of university admissions in the past, the phenomenon of high scorers flocking to specific prestigious universities appeared as a continuous trend even amidst changes in the admissions system. Through KBS News 9 report materials from the late 1980s to the early 1990s, the admissions environment and institutional characteristics of that time can be reconstructed.

Concentration of high scorers at Seoul National University and the end of the 'test first, apply later' system

In the late 1980s, the phenomenon of high scorers on the Academic Achievement Test concentrating on Seoul National University was one of the major characteristics of the admissions process. According to the freshman admission results announced by Seoul National University, 83% of those who scored 305 points or higher on the Academic Achievement Test passed Seoul National University, showing the concentration of high scorers at prestigious universities. This is at a similar level to the previous year, where 85% of those scoring 300 points or higher entered Seoul National University. The concentration of high scorers at Seoul National University continued, to the extent that 70% of students who received 300 points or more on the Academic Achievement Test passed Seoul National University.

At the time, the admissions system operated under a 'test first, apply later' system where the exam was taken first and then applied to universities, and the video reported that this admissions system was finally coming to an end. An official from Seoul National University stated that because many students with the same scores on the Academic Achievement Test gathered near the passing line, interview scores acted as a major variable for passing. Meanwhile, in 1987, the top scorer in the natural sciences at Seoul National University was Kim Yeong-ryong from Dongnae High School, who received 332 points on the Academic Achievement Test, and the top scorer in the humanities was Kim Yeong-su from Pohang Jecheol High School, who received 328 points.

Traffic congestion and tardiness, chaos at the admissions site

The congestion around universities on the day of the entrance exam shows a cross-section of the admissions culture at the time. From around 6:30 AM, examinees, families, and alumni from various high schools gathered around the testing sites. As most universities experienced extreme traffic congestion within a 5–10 km radius, incidents occurred where many examinees were late.

In fact, about 100 examinees who applied to Universidad Kookmin were unable to enter the testing site on time, leading the school to take measures to delay the entry time until after 9:00 AM. The structural characteristic where many examinees gathered at a single school rather than being dispersed, and the lack of automotive civic consciousness caused by vehicles carrying examinees waiting at the main gate, fueled this congestion.

Changing question trends requiring application beyond simple memorization

The difficulty and question trends of the Academic Achievement Test also changed according to the demands of the era. The examination committee made efforts to set easier questions than in previous years to normalize high school education, but actual examinees felt that the difficulty was higher than the previous year because there were many comprehensive questions requiring application and thinking skills rather than fragmentary knowledge.

Subjective questions were set within a 30% range for all subjects, but rather than completion-type questions where one inserts a single word, many descriptive short-answer and phrase-based short-answer questions were set, which were difficult for students who studied focusing on memorization. Looking at each subject, Korean had a high proportion of modern literature at 56%, and the proportion of descriptive short-answer questions was increased to evaluate reading comprehension, thinking skills, and writing skills. For English, there were more questions to measure reading comprehension, and for Mathematics, questions that required understanding basic principles and using them comprehensively were predominant. Korean History measured whether one could comprehensively grasp the causal relationships of events, and for Social Studies, the proportion of economic questions was set higher than in the political, social, and cultural fields to strengthen economic education. Science subjects focused on evaluating the understanding of basic concepts and application abilities.