[Parliamentary Audit] Kim Moonsoo: "Expanding Short-Answer and Essay Assessments Is Essential... AI Adoption Should Ease Teachers' Workload"

AI teaching assistant emerges to ease teachers' heavy workload
Even education offices that have yet to adopt it say, "We support expanding its use"

The introduction of an AI scoring system to expand short-answer and essay-type assessments came under scrutiny at the National Assembly. While such assessments are considered essential to strengthening students' capabilities, calls were made to actively use AI technology to ease teachers' excessive workload and prevent disputes over fairness.

At a parliamentary audit by the National Assembly's Education Committee on October 20, Kim Moonsoo, a Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker, compared the university grades of students admitted through regular and rolling admissions and emphasized the importance of short-answer and essay-type assessments.

Democratic Party of Korea lawmaker Kim Moonsoo

"Students admitted through rolling admissions earn higher grades and show greater class participation and enthusiasm," Kim said. "Statistics show that students admitted through regular admissions based on the multiple-choice College Scholastic Ability Test earn lower university grades. In the long term, expanding a rolling admissions system centered on short-answer and essay-type assessments would be desirable for education in South Korea."

However, he ruled out introducing short-answer and essay questions to the College Scholastic Ability Test right away. Kim pointed to the difficulty of doing so, saying, "In our country, even excellent educational content is unlikely to be accepted unless fairness is guaranteed."

Instead, he argued that short-answer and essay-type assessments in middle and high schools, which already account for 20-30% of students' school grades, should be expanded further. He strongly proposed introducing AI assessment systems as a way to ease the additional burden this would place on teachers.

Kim explained the system's effectiveness by showing a video of Gyeonggi Province's AI assessment system for short-answer and essay-type responses. According to the video, a teacher uploads a question and a student's answer, which the AI analyzes. The teacher checks and corrects typos and handwriting that is difficult to read, after which the AI scores the answer. The AI provides the score along with the rationale for it, and the teacher uses this information to assign the final score.

"The AI conducts the initial assessment to assist the teacher, while the teacher makes the final decision, allowing us to achieve both fairness and efficiency," he explained.

The use of AI assessment tools currently varies by region. Daejeon and South Chungcheong have introduced them on a trial basis, while Sejong, North Chungcheong, North Jeolla, South Jeolla, Gwangju, and Jeju have yet to adopt them. However, regardless of whether they have introduced AI systems, all regions share the goal of expanding short-answer and essay-type assessments.

Commenting on this, Daejeon Superintendent of Education Oh Seokjin said, "The final decision rests with teachers, but I believe it is important to actively use AI to help reduce their workload," giving a positive assessment of the pilot operation of the AI scoring system.

By contrast, Jeju Superintendent of Education Ko Euisuk, whose region has not yet introduced an AI scoring system, said, "We are working to expand short-answer and essay-type assessments, but we are not yet using a separate platform."

She added, "We currently encourage independent use of the platform within Jeju Badak, an integrated teaching and learning platform, and plan to gradually expand its adoption through cooperation with other provincial and metropolitan offices of education."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.