Korean Placement, Course Certificates and Admission Evidence: Five Records to Distinguish
Separate starting-level diagnosis, learning records and admission evidence. Official Online KSI guidance supports a five-record working table.
A Korean placement result, completion certificate and attendance confirmation serve different purposes. Partners should separate starting level, learning history and admission evidence. Similar words such as “Korean” or “Sejong” in a document name do not make documents interchangeable.
Placement identifies where learning should begin
Online King Sejong Institute’s level test supports appropriate placement and assesses beginner/intermediate listening and reading. Record the tool, provider, date, areas and recommended course.
Teachers may add speaking or writing tasks for class placement. Keep those as separate teacher judgements rather than attributing every skill to the original test. Connect results to learning needs instead of inventing a TOPIK conversion.
Distinguish documents after a course
Online KSI’s certificate guidance distinguishes completion and attendance documents using course-type and learning requirements. Self-learning courses issue neither. These documents cannot be used for visa issuance; admission recognition is a question for the university.
Record the actual course, period, format and document issued. Preserve the original document name and provider rather than relabelling participation as completion or self-study as certified completion.
A GEA table of document purposes
Evidence | Purpose | Record | Next action |
|---|---|---|---|
Placement result | Starting level | Tool, date, areas, recommended level | Choose classes and support |
Completion certificate | Course requirements met | Provider, course, type, completion date | Check receiving institution’s scope |
Attendance confirmation | Participation requirements | Title, period, issuer | Keep distinct from completion |
Self-study history | Learning plan and progress | Materials, period, content studied | Teacher check and next assessment |
Admission evidence | Programme language requirement | Accepted evidence, score/level, validity | Match the admission guide |
This is GEA’s proposed working table. Keep each document’s role rather than marking the student simply “Korean complete.”
Give the student two next actions
Consider a hypothetical student bringing a placement result and attendance confirmation. Education staff use the assessed areas and recent learning to choose a class and supplementary tasks. Admissions staff separately compare the target programme’s recognised evidence.
Give the student one page with current learning tasks and evidence still needed before application. Recognition depends on the named institution, course and requirements, not resemblance between certificate names. Connect testing, results and issue dates with the application deadline.
Preserve names and dates when updating
Add newly issued results and their purpose rather than deleting the earlier diagnostic or learning history. If completion is later confirmed, retain what changed from the participation record. Check the student name, provider and course against the submitted document.
For cooperation with GEA, prepare the diagnostic tool, Korean course, issued-document names and target university/intake. These define the assessment and evidence work needed for education and application separately.
Related guides
Sources
Sources checked: 24 October 2026.
Official resources
Updated · 2026-10-24
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