This study analyzes the operational status of Career Experience Support Centers designated by the Seoul Metropolitan Government and examines the differences and challenges of two management models—direct public operation and outsourced operation—across three core domains: school support, program quality management, and human and organizational management. First, in the domain of school support, although a demand survey and annual planning system based on the academic calendar have been established, teacher rotation and a lack of programs for elementary and high schools have led to disruption in school–center collaboration. Second, in the domain of program quality management, regional bias in site discovery and burdensome certification procedures were identified as constraints, whereas the pilot→feedback→improvement cycle and the development of new-industry content such as maker and VR programs yielded positive outcomes. Moreover, performance management was found to underrepresent actual educational effectiveness and community networking despite high quantitative evaluation scores (above 90), indicating a need for more balanced metrics. Third, in the domain of human and organizational management, common challenges included insufficient budgets and staffing alongside ‘passion-pay’ workload issues. Directly operated centers exhibited high stability but low flexibility, whereas outsourced centers demonstrated strong expertise and responsiveness but faced employment instability. Based on these findings, we propose four policy and practice recommendations to enhance the sustainability of Career Experience Support Centers: (1) establish grade-specific collaborative forums; (2) implement flexible compensation and incentive systems; (3) foster expert partnerships in direct operation and extend long-term contracts in outsourced operation; and (4) develop standardized criteria for center director selection and evaluation.
Kangmin Seo (Thu,) studied this question.