K-pop High Schools to Open in Busan and Singapore
K-pop, short for Korean pop, is one of the world's most popular genres of music, and groups like BTS and Blackpink have huge numbers of fans all over the globe.
But becoming a K-pop superstar isn't something that just happens overnight. Many K-pop artists have to go through years of intensive training before they can release any music.
In South Korea, there are a number of after-school academies for training the K-pop stars of the future. And there are even high schools specializing in K-pop training.
The first high school dedicated to K-pop, the High School of Korean Pop and Performing Arts, opened in South Chungcheong province in 2020.
And soon, future K-pop stars living in Busan, South Korea's second biggest city, will have a school of their own, too.
The education department of Busan, located on Korea's southern coast, has announced that it will be opening a new K-pop high school there in March 2028.
The new school will focus on K-pop and performance arts, offering students classes in singing, dancing, composing and writing songs. The classes will be taught by those with experience in the K-pop industry.
The K-pop school will accept students from all over the country, as well as international students.
But students from Southeast Asia might not have to travel to South Korea to learn how to be a K-pop artist.
The prestigious School of Performing Arts Seoul, also known as SOPA, is collaborating with Singapore Raffles Music College to open the first international K-pop school in Singapore.
While it's not a dedicated K-pop training school, some of K-pop's most famous stars are graduates of SOPA, including Jungkook from BTS.
The Singapore school plans to open its doors to its first 75 students in the second half of 2024.
