A survey of 8,476 students conducted late last year by the Blue Tree Foundation found 12.5 percent of elementary students reported abuse. This significantly outpaced older groups, with 3.4 percent of middle school students and 1.6 percent of high school students reporting similar harm.
The foundation attributed the elementary school spike to younger children struggling to separate rough play from actual harm. While verbal abuse remained the most common form of violence across all grades at 23.8 percent, physical violence jumped from 10.6 percent in 2023 to 17.9 percent, marking its highest share since the current survey series began in 2019.
"Elementary students can feel the boundary between physical play, rough-housing, and violence as ambiguous," Kim Mi-jung, head of the foundation's counseling division, said at a press conference. "A child may think it was fine while playing together, but a day later decides it was harmful and reports it."
Cyberbullying, which made up 14.5 percent of overall cases, showed a decisive shift toward online gaming. Roughly 40 percent of cyber-violence victims cited gaming platforms as the source, with 95.7 percent of that group stating the abuse crossed back and forth between online and offline environments.
Witness intervention deteriorated sharply alongside the rising violence rates. The proportion of students who saw an incident but took no action reached 54.6 percent, more than doubling from 21.5 percent in 2021.
Institutional responses also showed strain following the March 2024 launch of a new district-level disciplinary system by the Ministry of Education. The share of victims who reported abuse but saw no resulting action tripled to 33 percent from 2021, even as 70.8 percent of victims stated they primarily wanted an apology from the perpetrator.
The foundation called on local election candidates to adopt stronger administrative responses and expanded mental health infrastructure ahead of the June 3 vote. "School violence policy is an important benchmark for student safety and trust in the school system," Lee Jong-ik, the foundation's chief executive, said.
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