This photo shows Son Heung-min of the South Korean men's national soccer team during the 1-1 draw against Palestine on Nov.2- in their Group B match in the third round of the Asian World Cup qualifiers in Seoul. Son is among the most accomplished and most popular athletes in South Korea. (Yonhap)

The most preferred career for elementary school students is professional athlete while middle and high school students picked teaching as their dream job, according to a government report Wednesday.

The Korea Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training and the Ministry of Education surveyed 38,481 students, parents and faculty members at 1,200 schools across the country from May 23 to June 31 to ask about their future plans.

Some 12.9 percent of the elementary school students said they wished to be an athlete when they grow up, followed by 6.1 percent who picked a doctor and 4.8 percent who chose an "internet content creator," referring to YouTube. This marked the seventh straight year that athletes topped the list of dream jobs for the age group.

Among middle school students, 6.8 percent of the respondents picked teacher, followed by 5.9 percent who replied athlete and 5.1 percent who said doctor.

Teaching also topped the list for high school students with 6.9 percent, followed by nurse (5.8 percent) and soldier (2.7 percent). A military career was outside the top 10 in last year's survey (11th) but surged in popularity this year.

When asked the most important factor in choosing a job, the No.1 reason for all students was "something that I love to do," picked by 52.5 percent, 51.3 percent, and 44.3 percent of the elementary, middle and high school students, respectively.

The second popular answer was "something I can do well," chosen by 18.2 percent of elementary, 19 percent of middle and 20.3 percent of high school students. The third was "I could make a lot of money," picked by 9.7 percent of elementary school students, 10.9 percent of middle school students, and 10.9 percent of high school students.

For high school students, researchers asked about their plans after graduation. About 66.5 percent said they plan to go to college, marking a significant decrease from 77.3 percent the year before.

In contrast, the percentage of those who said they plan to get a job went from 7 percent in 2023 to 13.3 percent in 2024. The rest were undecided.

The percentage of high school students planning to start their own business had increased every year from 1.5 percent in 2018 to 5.2 percent in 2023, but decreased to 3.3 percent this year.