The rate of high school students dropping out raised steadily for three consecutive years, increasing from 1.1 per cent in 2020 to 1.9 per cent in 2022.
SEOUL – Forget beauty vloggers and celebrity content – vlogs made by South Korean high school dropouts are happening to be amazingly renowned among teen viewers on YouTube. Apart from conversing about daily life updates after dropping out of school, these teenage YouTubers also make videos where they tell their parents about the decision to drop out, submit withdrawal letters and have a last-day-of-school party with their classmates.
“I made a decision to vlog about my dropout experiences because I wished people to have a better knowledge regarding (the process),” said YouTuber Park Jun-a in one of her videos. Like Ms Park, many high school dropouts have started YouTube to converse about their experiences, with some garnering up to nine million views. Remarks left on videos are mostly optimistic, with one reading: “Dropping out isn’t a convenient decision to make, and I’m proud of you for making a decision that you are glad with.” Ms Lee Chae-won, a 16-year-old high school student told The Korea Herald that she has a lot of fun viewing dropout vlogs to see “what life is like outside of school”.