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Inter-American Development Bank. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons IGO 3.0 Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives (CC-IGO BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO) license (http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo/legalcode) and may be reproduced with attribution to the IDB and for any noncommercial purpose. No derivative work is allowed.Any dispute related to the use of the works of the IDB that cannot be settled amicably shall be submitted to arbitration pursuant to the UNCITRAL rules. The use of the IDB's name for any purpose other than for attribution, and the use of IDB's logo shall be subject to a separate written license agreement between the IDB and the user and is not authorized as part of this CC-IGO license.Note that link provided above includes additional terms and conditions of the license.The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the Inter-American Development Bank, its Board of Directors, or the countries they represent.http://www.iadb.org 2015 List of Acronyms Executive SummaryKorea has invested heavily in education and the development of an education system aligned with its national development plans by adopting a sequential approach, both in terms of school levels and the quantity and quality of education. Working on one educational level at a time, Korea has focused on developing its educational system, beginning with primary education in the 1950s, secondary education in the 1970s and 1980s, and higher education in the 1990s and 2000s. The first goals pertained to meeting demand for the quantity of education provided. The universalization of primary, secondary and higher education was achieved in 1957, 1999 and 2000, respectively. Now, Korea has started to invest in factors that aim to improve the quality of education, using metrics such as pupil-teacher ratios, class size, student satisfaction with school, and research and development outcomes of higher education institutions (HEIs).This sequential development strategy of Korea is distinguished from those of countries in LAC and Africa, which were at a similar stage of development as Korea in the 1960s, but invested at every level of education simultaneously. As a result of the unique approach, Korea has accomplished education development in quantity as well as in quality in a relatively short time. Korean students have consistently achieved high scores on international academic assessments for more than a decade. In addition to high academic achievement, the Korean educational system tries to nurture the development of noncognitive skills of students, such as compassion, communication, responsibility, creativity, passion, etc., to enable them to work collaboratively and effectively in the increasingly global, technological and knowledge-based economy.At the higher education level, attention is directed to the global competitiveness of universities internationally and governments continue to increase their investments in higher education in an attempt to raise the res...

This article explores the implications of the recent increase in older students at Korean universities dominated by younger students. A case study design is used to gain an in-depth understanding of experiences of older students in a Korean university. Semi-structured interviews of twelve older students, three professors, two administrators, and four younger students at the university were conducted for the date collection. The results suggest that the experiences of Korean older students differed from those of counterparts in western countries since academic and extracurricular services of Korean universities were geared towards younger students and thus were unhelpful for older students with multiple responsibilities at work and home. Also, the results show that traditional hierarchical relationships between younger and older students created strains for older students who had to rely heavily on younger counterparts. This study's findings highlight the crucial roles of higher education systems and culture in the experiences of older Asian students.