This study is to explore whether autonomous private high schools(jasago,
hreafter "APHS"), which introduced by the last Lee Myung-bak
administration, bring meaningful changes in the school level, using
institutional theoretical framework and multiple case study method. For this
purpose, four APHSs of Seoul, Kyunggi, and Incheon areas were selected
with permission of the principals and major findings are as follows: First,
three APHSs, moved from previous general high schools to APHSs, are
struggling with controlling the influence of strong institutional environments,
regulation on the selection of candidates, teacher personnel system, and
frequent controlling practices of higher administration offices. On the
contrary, the newly established APHS is trying to overcome the influence
from the institutional environments by settling exceeding educational
conditions and strong exercise of principalship, which are fully supported by
the foundation. Second, although the four APHSs commonly has acquired
some autonomy in the area of curriculum and finance, this kind of
autonomy is able to be realized only when fully qualified teachers are
participating in several reformative changes of the schools. Third, as a new
type of high schools, psychological apprehension and environmental
instability around how long the APHS system can survive is working as
hindrance to the stable development of the APHS. Some policy implications
are suggested based on the above findings.