Expansion of support to multicultural families tailored according to life stage

The Seoul Metropolitan Government (SMG) will expand its support to multicultural families living in the city tailored according to life stage. With the significant rise in the number of multicultural families, the city established its basic policy plan for foreign residents and multicultural families to support their adaptation and assimilation. Starting this year, the city’s expanded support tailored according to life stage will encompass care services and packages to support children’s growth as well as enhanced employment support and more. First, the city will expand its care services, increasing the number of medical interpreters and the number of care workers to 16, as well as increasing the number of district-run family centers to 7 to strengthen care services. Moreover, the city will launch a mobile medical interpreter reservation system for added convenience of users and even provide part-time child care services to alleviate the burden of child care for multicultural families. Second, the city will provide care packages to support children’s growth, including personal tutor services where educators visit multicultural households to teach children basic education, career and enrollment support programs that provide comprehensive services from counseling with parents and briefings on school enrollment to job experience, and even FC soccer classes. Third, the city will expand its employment support to actively facilitate employment for multicultural families by operating an employment-focused institution for multicultural families and to assist marriage migrants’ job-seeking efforts by rolling out a new program that provides practical experience and improves their employment competency through assistance services such as interpretation and translation. Seoul plans to develop more tangible policies to provide tailored support to multicultural families in line with the significant rise in the number of multicultural families and its status as a global city.