A teacher at Jeju Jungang Girls High School in Jeju Island, leads a mock online class on April 1, 2020. (Yonhap)
SEOUL, Sept. 29 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea will set up gigabit wireless networks for all elementary, middle and high schools by the first half of next year as online classes have become a new social norm following the coronavirus outbreak.
The Ministry of Education and Regional Offices of Education announced on Monday that they will invest a total of 370 billion won (US$317 million) to install wireless routers in 209,000 classrooms nationwide by the first half of next year.
Wireless routers play a crucial role in connecting each school’s internal network with mobile and other devices.
The government explained that setting up 200,000 wireless routers will become one of South Korea’s largest governmental projects.
Once the wireless network is in place, smart devices and a variety of online content will become available for use, while teachers will be offered a stable environment to teach students online.
Currently, many schools use wired networks or mini-routers to teach classes online, which often results in issues with the speed and stability of the internet.
Now, with new Wi-Fi 6-based wireless routers in place, data speeds will jump by as much as 105 percent.
In addition, compatible network devices will be introduced to enable management of software-designed networks (SDN).
Ashley Song (ashley@koreabizwire.com)
