Get Schooled — Chapter 169¶
Complete Detailed Panel-by-Panel Transcription¶
Scope¶
This transcription follows all 22 ordered reader images in the uploaded Chapter 169 archive. Readable committee language, labor-policy commentary, and Ministry dialogue are preserved where legible.
Content note¶
The chapter discusses substitute-teacher dismissal, institutional cover-ups, labor precarity, and a parent using government authority to pressure a school.
Images 001–003 — The committee rules on Cheolyong’s conduct¶
The Teachers’ Rights Protection Committee convenes.
The investigation finds that substitute teachers throughout the school experienced disrespect and unequal treatment. Lee Seoni’s case is the most severe, involving repeated verbal abuse, humiliation, physical attacks, and intimidation.
Cheolyong is expelled and referred for criminal investigation for assault-related conduct.
The ruling publicly recognizes that temporary status does not remove teachers’ rights.
For a moment, it appears that the case has succeeded.
Images 004–006 — Seoni’s contract still ends¶
The principal meets Seoni privately.
He tells her that her contract will end that month.
The stated reason is not punishment: the permanent teacher whose leave created the vacancy is returning earlier than expected.
Legally and administratively, the substitute position therefore disappears.
The timing makes the result feel indistinguishable from retaliation even if the paperwork is technically valid.
Seoni absorbs the news quietly.
Images 007–009 — Why Na allows the principal to appear “good”¶
Na and Hanrim discuss media coverage.
The school and principal are being praised as exemplary for confronting a substitute-teacher rights problem.
Hanrim dislikes the idea that an administrator who helped suppress abuse can receive positive publicity.
Na explains that one of the education system’s most destructive habits is public stigmatization.
When a serious incident occurs, institutions often hide it because everyone associated with the school may be treated as equally guilty. He compares the dynamic to scandals surrounding deaths or abuse at military bases: the public arrives in force, consumes the outrage, tears apart identifiable people, and rarely follows the exact facts or aftermath.
If every school that reports a problem is destroyed, future schools will conceal more.
Na therefore wants visible rewards for institutions that eventually cooperate and correct abuse—even when cooperation began under pressure.
Images 010–012 — Hanrim tries to stop the contract termination¶
Hanrim returns to the school and finds staff preparing for Seoni’s departure.
Colleagues say it is unfortunate because the environment finally started becoming normal.
They also say nothing can be done about the structure of a substitution contract.
Hanrim confronts the principal.
She grabs or threatens him and reminds him that he promised no substitute would suffer for cooperating with the investigation.
The principal argues that the permanent employee’s early return genuinely ends the vacancy. He asks whether Hanrim treats Ministry regulations as a joke.
Hanrim threatens his position again.
Seoni intervenes.
She asks Hanrim to stop and says she does not want her final days turned into another violent scene.
Hanrim respects the victim’s decision and releases him.
Images 013–015 — Seoni leaves the school¶
Outside, Seoni realizes that the red-haired woman is Inspector Lim Hanrim, the same person who worked beside her under a substitute identity.
Hanrim offers her a ride home.
Three weeks later, Seoni carries a box out of school while colleagues applaud and thank her.
She explains that the teacher on parental leave simply returned early, so the contract had to end.
She refuses to define the entire experience only as defeat. Because the agency exposed the rights problem, other schools may become safer for temporary teachers.
She says she will look for another placement next year.
Images 016–018 — Equal rights are not the same as automatic permanent status¶
Narration broadens the issue.
Substitute teachers usually sign contracts lasting a few months to one year. That insecurity pressures them to endure unfair duties and abuse.
A 2017 movement to convert some long-term substitutes into permanent employees faced strong opposition. Critics called it reverse discrimination against people who passed the national teacher recruitment examination. The proposal was abandoned.
The chapter does not claim every substitute should automatically receive permanent status.
It makes a narrower demand:
teachers performing the same educational duties must possess equal basic rights and protection from retaliation.
Images 019–020 — A new Ministry burden¶
Back at the agency office, Na and Hanrim have stayed up all night preparing a national audit report.
A Ministry official, Wang Soyu, changes the deadline from Friday to the next day because she intends to go on vacation.
She tells the team to email the completed document and treats the consequences for their workload as irrelevant.
Her assistant or colleague, Assistant Deputy Director Kim Jingsu, appears nearby.
Na notices Wang’s confidence in using rank to rearrange other people’s lives.
Images 021–022 — “Emperor’s DNA”¶
The final scene introduces Wang as the mother or guardian of a boy named Lee Hyunjong.
A teacher calls because Hyunjong’s violence is worsening and other children are being injured.
Wang rejects the concern.
She announces that her family belongs to the Kaesong Wang clan and descends from the Goryeo royal line. Because Goryeo rulers used imperial titles, she says Hyunjong possesses:
EMPEROR’S DNA
In her version of events, the problem is never her son. Other children provoke a superior child because they cannot understand him.
She orders the teacher to treat Hyunjong like a crown prince.
The chapter ends by connecting Wang’s abuse of bureaucratic rank with the absolute authority she grants her child.
Chapter-level continuity notes¶
A successful rights ruling does not erase labor precarity¶
Cheolyong is punished, yet Seoni still loses the job because the contract is attached to another employee’s absence.
Na chooses incentive over pure public punishment¶
Praising eventual cooperation may feel morally unsatisfying, but it reduces the reason schools hide future incidents.
Seoni controls the final confrontation¶
Hanrim wants to force the principal to keep the promise. Seoni chooses not to build her departure around another act of coercion.
The policy distinction is deliberate¶
The chapter separates permanent appointment from equal workplace rights. One may require competitive recruitment; the other should not depend on contract type.
Wang’s introduction mirrors the previous principal¶
Both use institutional status to place themselves or their child beyond ordinary rules.