The share of elementary, middle and high school students who said they suffered or witnessed school violence has steadily increased over the past five years. In particular, the witness response rate for school violence nearly tripled, rising from the 2% range in 2020 to 6.7% this year.
According to the "first 2026 school violence survey" released by the Ministry of Education on the 9th, this year's victim response rate for school violence was 2.9%, up 0.4 percentage points from a year earlier. It is the highest level in the past five years.
The survey was conducted from Apr. 14 to May 13. A total of 3.19 million students from fourth grade in elementary school through third grade in high school participated.
By school level, the victim response rate was highest among elementary school students at 5.7%. The rates for middle and high school students were 2.3% and 0.8%, respectively, was found.
By type of harm, verbal abuse was most common at 37.8%, followed by group bullying (17.1%), physical violence (15.7%), and cyberbullying (7.0%). Compared with last year, the shares of verbal abuse and cyberbullying decreased by 1.2 percentage points and 0.8 percentage points, respectively, while group bullying and physical violence increased by 0.7 percentage points and 1.1 percentage points, respectively.
The number of students who said they witnessed school violence also increased sharply. The witness response rate was 6.7% this year, up 0.6 percentage points from last year. It rose from 2.28% in 2020 to 2.3% in 2021, 3.8% in 2022, 4.6% in 2023, 5.0% in 2024, and 6.1% last year, and it increased again this year. In particular, the witness response rate was 11.0% among elementary school students, 6.8% among middle school students, and 2.6% among high school students.
However, the Ministry of Education said that as students and parents have become more sensitive to school violence, cases of everyday conflicts between students being filed as school violence are increasing.
Cases of school violence reported to education support offices last year totaled 56,880, down from the previous year, but the share that proceeded to deliberation increased to 51.7%. The share decided as "not school violence" as a result of deliberation also rose to 22.1%.
In results from the Ministry of Education gathering on-site opinions from students, teachers and Commissioners of the school violence countermeasure deliberation committee, some said, "There are many cases where something that started as a prank escalates and leads to school violence."
However, in recent days, new forms of school violence, such as the so-called "yacha rule" and "sparring," are also emerging. The "yacha rule" refers to a format of indiscriminate fighting that takes place anywhere without protective gear. It is spreading among teenagers, and videos of the fights are being filmed and distributed online. More recently, there have been cases in which a so-called "iljin" student instigates two students to fight, films the scene, and distributes the video.
The Ministry of Education said, "To raise awareness in schools about new types of school violence such as the recent yacha rule and sparring, we will strengthen cooperation with metropolitan and provincial education offices so that serious acts of aggression are strictly deliberated and addressed."
It will also move beyond prevention education focused on simple reporting and information provision to develop and distribute school level-specific educational materials that boost students' practical response capabilities, such as how to cope with conflict situations and defensive actions. Starting in the second semester this year, it will also expand an experiential, practice-based prevention education model centered on "lead schools for the Plus Harmony school violence prevention program."
Shim Min-cheol, director general of the student health and safety policy bureau at the Ministry of Education, said, "We will do our best to establish effective prevention education that builds real conflict response skills and to embed educational resolutions centered on restoring relationships in the field," adding, "We will also respond swiftly to the ever-emerging new forms of school violence on the ground in close cooperation with related ministries, including the Korean National Police Agency."