Flights halted, stock markets open late for South Korea's big exam

Half a million South Koreans participated in the annual nationwide college entrance exam on Thursday, marking the first time in four years that the exam which holds significant importance in the highly competitive society has been conducted without pandemic-related restrictions.Approximately 505,000 high school students, graduates, and others registered to take the single-day, five-session College Scholastic Ability Test (CSAT) at 1,279 test sites across the country, as reported by the education ministry. Unlike the past three years, test-takers were not obliged to wear face masks.Considered a crucial assessment in the country, the annual exam is renowned for its significance. Notably, even airline flights are halted during the listening comprehension portion of the English test.South Korean financial markets opened an hour later than usual at 10 a.m. (0100 GMT) to ease traffic.Outside schools, parents cheered for their children, hugging them and some wiping away tears."I feel so nervous. Maybe I'm more nervous (than my daughter)," said Kim Mi-jae, mother of a 18-year-old student, after sending off her daughter for the exam at a high school in Seoul.The difficulty of this year's exam has yet to be confirmed, but South Korean officials have said it would not include the so-called "killer questions" typically drawn from material not covered in the public school curriculum.President Yoon Suk Yeol has blamed such questions as the cause of excessive spending on private education, one of the factors behind the country's declining fertility rate.South Koreans spent a record 26 trillion won ($19.97 billion) on private education last year, despite a declining student population, a government report showed.With inputs from Reuters.