A difference between the Korean system and the Australian system that I have seen has been that the Korean system puts the most stress on high school students with their one exam for getting into a good university, once in uni they can relax a bit. In Australia, while highschool can be stressful, it’s not the only way to get into university and there is not as much stress to get into a certain uni, instead the stress comes once in university where you can be marked harshly and so much is expected of you. I know many Korean students (who go to Australia for uni) have been shocked at how harshly they were marked in Australia because they thought the hard thing was getting into uni, not completing it.

In Korea there is a lot of talk about which university someone went to, rather than what they actually studied… it’s something that contributes to highschool student’s stress about their exam because all the pressure is about getting into the few ‘top’ universities.