Teaching institutions to conduct mandatory background checks

Tutoring institutions must conduct mandatory background checks on candidates for sexual crimes before they are hired, said a new notice issued by the Ministry of Education.

The ministry said in the notice on Friday that all staff at academic and non-academic institutions, including tutors, researchers and others must all undergo such background checks.

Tutoring institutions should submit an application to the national after-school tutoring supervision and service platform to check whether the candidates have committed sexual crimes or other crimes that is unfit to work near children.

If the candidates are found to have records of previous sexual crimes, they should not be hired and the tutoring institutions should inform the candidates of the reason for not hiring, the notice said.

The candidate has 15 days to apply for re-checks if they have questions about the results.

Tutoring institutions will be held responsible if they do not conduct the mandatory checks, do not deal with people who are found with sexual crime history, or leak such information.

Education authorities should work with cultural and tourism, sports, and technology authorities to conduct routine inspections on tutoring institutions to make sure they conduct the mandatory background checks and the basic information of all people working there are included on the national platform.

In April, the ministry has asked schools and universities to conduct similar checks on sexual crimes of teacher candidates before they are hired.

They also need to check whether the candidates have been included on the blacklist for teachers and whether their teaching credentials are valid or not.

The Criminal Law, the Law on the Protection of Minors, the Teachers Law and the Regulation on Teachers' Qualifications all stipulate that people with specific criminal records cannot work as teachers and staff in educational institutions.