Skirtroversy in Korea

From Busan Haps


Short-skirted students are a common sight in Japan, but a new thing for Korea. As the skirts get shorter, governments look for innovative ways to accommodate the trend. Rarely before has 'innovative' been the appropriate word. They are seeking to redress the situation without asking students to re-dress.

GANGWON-DO, South Korea -- As kids, one of the first lessons we learn is to take on a problem at its source. And, more often than not, if you can get to the root of what’s ailing you, then you can remedy it and all of its repercussions.

Or, so we were told.

In response to the ever shortening skirts worn to school by Korean middle and high school students, the local assembly in Gangwon province will put the cart before the horse. Or, in this case, the board before the students.

Rather than forcing female students to lengthen their uniform skirts, they have instead proposed spending around $700,000 installing boards in front of some 50,000 desks to block any hint of a view of student's legs in the classrooms.

To be sure, it’s a confusing remedy. Does this say more about student’s skirt length or the school board’s worry of the wondering eyes of district teachers?

To the governments credit, they are employing this unusual redress without asking students to re-dress. This all in the name of avoiding an infringement on the ever expanding freedoms that Koreans are enjoying for the first time since the country’s founding in 1948.