South Korean government announced on Tuesday that the College Scholastic Ability Test, or the national college entrance exam, will be postponed for two weeks, and the new semester for elementary and secondary schools will start online in batches starting April 9 due to the novel coronavirus, according to South Korean media reports.

The college entrance exam will be postponed from November 19 to December 3, and the release date of the exam results will also be delayed to December 23.

This is the fourth time that college entrance exam has been delayed in South Korea's history since the exam system was implemented in 1993. The previous three one-week delays occurred in 2005, 2010 and 2017.

This year's two-week delay is unprecedented and the first delay due to an infectious disease.

The South Korean government also said that 5.4 million students in elementary and secondary schools will welcome the new semester online for the first time.

The third grades in middle and high schools will be the first batch to start remote online learning on April 9, other grades in middle and high schools and fourth to sixth grades in elementary schools will start on April 16, and first to third grades in elementary schools will start on April 20. The reopening time for kindergartens is pending.

The new 2020 semester was originally scheduled to begin on March 2, and was postponed for three times on March 9, March 23 and April 6 due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 epidemic.

According to South Korea's Central Discharge Countermeasure Headquarters, the confirmed cases in the country has increased to 9,786 as of midnight Tuesday local time.

(Cover image: A student takes remote learning. /VCG)