Lee Ji-hyun (24), Top Scorer in the Finance Category of the 40th Legislative Examination in 2024  
Graduate of Gyeonggi Foreign Language High School · Currently enrolled in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Social Sciences at Seoul National University  

**Keys to Passing: "Practice Tests" and "Time Management" for the 1st Exam, "Answer Study Groups" and "Readable Answers" for the 2nd Exam**  
**Consistent Effort and Self-Belief as the Key to Success**  
**Pledge to Serve the Public as a Passionate Civil Servant**  

[Legal Journal = Reporter Lee Sang-yeon] On the 2nd, the final 12 successful candidates of the 2024 40th Legislative Examination were announced. This year, the legislative exam saw 2,751 applicants, resulting in a record-breaking average competition rate of 229:1. Among those who overcame this fierce competition to achieve the honor of passing, the finance category produced an unusual situation where joint top scorers emerged due to tied scores.  

The results of this legislative exam reflect the high level of interest among young talents in entering public service, while also reaffirming the importance of securing exceptional individuals for the development of the National Assembly. Attention is now focused on how the future contributions of these newly appointed legislative officials will impact the progress of our nation’s parliament.  

Legal Journal met with Lee Ji-hyun (24), who achieved the highest score in the finance category of this legislative exam with an average of 69.47 points in the second exam, earning her the honor of being the top scorer. A graduate of Gyeonggi Foreign Language High School and currently a student in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Social Sciences at Seoul National University, Lee expressed that she still felt stunned by the unexpected outcome.  

“I wasn’t even expecting to pass the second exam, so I was really worried about failing the interview even after making it through the second round. To get such an unexpectedly great result makes me incredibly happy. Passing alone would have been thrilling, but being the top scorer? It’s honestly unbelievable.”  

Lee’s journey toward the legislative exam began during her high school years with her studies in economics. Her growing interest in economic policy naturally led her to aspire to a career in public service. Initially, she aimed for the administrative exam, but after passing the first stage of the legislative exam, she shifted her focus.  

“The idea of participating directly in the legislative process as a National Assembly official was appealing to me. I wanted to contribute to shaping the foundation of policies.”  

During her three years of preparation, the secrets to her top-scoring success were “consistency” and “collaboration.” In particular, she built her skills by consistently participating in answer-writing study groups.  

“Doing it alone can make you lazy, but working with study group members kept us motivated. I could refer to excellent answers, and the sense of accountability pushed me to work harder,” she said.

Lee approached her constitutional law studies with the same systematic rigor as her PSAT preparation. “During my first attempt, I took a variety of academy lectures,” she said. “I attended everything from basic lectures to the 880 lectures and mock exam classes.”

Her strategy evolved over time to prioritize efficiency. “For my second and third attempts, I reviewed the 880 lectures at double speed,” she explained. “This allowed me to effectively recall forgotten material.”

Lee also shared her unique study methods. “I summarized frequently forgotten content from the 880 lectures into about 10 pages to review right before the exam. For details like quorum numbers or constitutional history, I organized them using the Quizlet app.”

She particularly emphasized the use of mobile apps. “There’s a constitutional law OX question app that I used for repetitive learning,” she said. “It was highly effective because I could make use of spare moments.”

As the top scorer, we were curious about how she prepared for the second exam. In this year’s legislative exam, Lee achieved an average score of 69.47 points in the second exam, securing her position as joint top scorer in the finance category. Her subject-specific scores were: Administrative Studies 60, Economics 70.66, Administrative Law 60.66, Public Finance 81, and Statistics 40.33, earning her the honor of being the top scorer.

Her administrative law studies focused on answer practice and supplementing with recent precedents. Initially relying on rote memorization, Lee shifted to intensive answer-writing practice after receiving low scores.

“At first, I focused on memorizing notes, but after getting very low scores in my first attempt, I decided to increase my answer practice,” she said. “Starting in August last year, I participated in case study sessions with study group members four times a week under an academy instructor. After March this year, I studied at Sparta, preparing with Sparta exams and the instructor’s third-cycle lectures. Toward the end, I supplemented my knowledge with another instructor’s special lectures on recent precedents and morning sessions.”

Lee also stressed the importance of consolidating materials. “I added Post-it notes to the instructor’s concise handbook with new insights I gained from classes or study sessions, creating a single, unified resource,” she added.

For economics, consistent problem-solving was key, she emphasized. “Regardless of the lecture cycle, I tried to solve at least five problems a day during the week,” she said. “In the second half of last year, I worked through Professor [Author’s] *Microeconomics Practice* and the instructor’s practice book, solving all the problems initially and later focusing on advanced ones. After this year’s first exam, I prioritized the practice book’s plus problems and past exam questions, then tackled steps 2 and 3 with the remaining time.”

Rather than consolidating economics into a single resource, Lee chose to supplement her weak areas. “I didn’t consolidate economics separately but noted deficiencies in my Trinity materials and reviewed them just before the exam to refresh my memory,” she said. “For international economics, I followed advice from a study group member who passed last year and used the instructor’s international economics practice book as a consolidated resource.”

For statistics, she studied systematically from basics to advanced levels. “Last year, I worked through the subjective statistics basic and advanced editions, and following advice from a study group member who passed earlier, I solved additional exercises from *Statistical Probability Distribution Theory*,” she said. “During this year’s third-cycle period, I revisited the advanced subjective statistics edition. Studying statistics in advance proved advantageous for legislative exam preparation.”

Public finance preparation involved practice problems and mock exams. “During both my second and third attempts, I solved public finance practice books during the December PSAT prep period. From March to June, I worked on the academy instructor’s real-world public finance problem sets and mock exam collections,” she said. “Since public finance often includes short-answer questions, I separately organized must-memorize content from the instructor’s book and reviewed it frequently before the exam.”

Lee also expressed some regrets about unexpected questions in this year’s exam. “This year, both the legislative and administrative exams included many questions on unique public finance concepts or theories that I couldn’t handle well,” she admitted. “I regret not studying public finance more diligently. In addition to my approach, I recommend reading various textbooks.”

For administrative studies, she benefited from answer-writing workshops and study groups. “Last year, I struggled a lot with administrative studies answers,” she said. “From October to December, I took an academy’s answer-writing workshop.” She continued, “This year, I attended the academy’s third-cycle lectures and separately conducted answer study sessions with group members. Since each member took different instructors’ classes, sharing the themes and content emphasized by each instructor was helpful.”

For administrative studies sub-notes, she tried various options before finding what suited her. “I bought several types of sub-notes but couldn’t find one that perfectly fit me. This year, I used an instructor’s keyword-based administrative studies book as my main resource and supplemented it with other materials,” she said.

Through our interview with Lee Ji-hyun, we also explored key subjects, strategies, and answer-writing tips for the second exam.

Regarding key subjects and strategies for the second exam, Lee emphasized that she invested significant time in economics and highlighted the importance of daily, consistent study. She also advised not neglecting public finance or elective subjects when preparing for the legislative exam.

“Since it’s the finance category, I thought economics was the most important, so I invested a lot of time in it,” she said. “I’m a bit embarrassed that my score was lower than expected, but since economics is a deciding factor, I think studying it steadily every day is crucial. For the legislative exam, following the third-cycle lecture sequence as is might lead you to neglect public finance or elective subjects before entering the exam hall. If you’re preparing for the legislative exam, studying public finance or political science in advance will help.”

When asked about answer-writing tips, she stressed the importance of enhancing readability. In administrative law, emphasizing precedents was effective, while in administrative studies, keeping paragraphs short and highlighting keywords worked well.

“For both administrative law and studies, I used various methods to make my answers stand out among numerous submissions by improving readability,” she said. “For administrative law, following advice from a study group member who passed, I focused on precedents rather than commonly cited theories. When writing precedents, I used the Chinese character ‘判例’ (precedent) and tried to include as much detail as I knew.”

She added, “For administrative studies, I learned a lot about writing readable answers from an instructor’s workshop. Keeping paragraphs short and emphasizing keywords helped improve my scores.”

We also delved into her interview preparation and the step-by-step process. Lee Ji-hyun provided a detailed explanation of her interview preparation, sharing her strategies and key points.

For interview preparation, she combined thorough study groups with personal efforts. “I conducted interview study sessions with other finance category passers,” she said. “We practiced for four hours a day, working on two GD (group discussion) topics and one PT (presentation) topic together.” She added, “Personally, I was interested in topics from the National Assembly Legislative Research Service’s *Issues of the Year (2023)*, so I familiarized myself with recent issues through those materials. I also prepared answers for questions based on my self-introduction and common interview questions.”

When asked about specific questions from the group discussion, presentation, and individual interview, she replied, “The group discussion focused on debating social issues, the presentation involved expressing my opinion on a given topic, and the individual interview included questions based on my self-introduction as well as inquiries about legislative responses to social issues.”

When asked what she thought was important in the interview, she highlighted several key points. “Since it’s a National Assembly interview, I think it’s crucial to be familiar with basic matters related to the Assembly,” she said. “You also need to prepare legislative responses to social issues.”

She continued, “Rather than just reading prepared content multiple times, practicing speaking it aloud yourself is more important. I also heard a lot of advice that attitude is as critical as content in an interview, so I tried to maintain a bright expression and speak clearly.”

Lee added, “Personally, I received feedback during interview prep that I speak too fast. For those who naturally speak quickly, practicing slow speech might be important.”

Lee emphasized the importance of attitude in interview preparation, practicing a bright expression and clear diction. She also advised that practicing speaking naturally is key to expressing prepared content effectively.

She openly shared the challenges she faced during her preparation period, her stress relief methods, and her future aspirations.

Lee cited health issues as the toughest part of her preparation period. “This year, I kept getting sick right before exams, which made it hard to focus on studying and took up time with hospital visits,” she said. “Whenever this happened, I tried to think of it as warding off bad luck and avoided stressing over my health.”

Though health issues can be a significant burden for examinees, Lee tackled them with a positive mindset.

Despite her knack for studying, she too experienced stress. She valued spending time with others as a way to relieve it. “Eating or chatting with study group members was a big help in reducing stress,” she said. “Seeing my family and boyfriend on weekends also helped a lot.”

When asked what kind of civil servant she wants to become, Lee expressed her desire to maintain her passion and commitment to serving the public. “I want to preserve the passion and determination I had while studying and become a civil servant who serves the people,” she said.

Her goal is to use the knowledge and enthusiasm gained through her studies for the benefit of the public.

When asked to give a word to fellow examinees, she encouraged them to believe in themselves and persevere to the end. “I think this exam is tough because the results of your efforts don’t show immediately,” she said. “But the hard work you put in is never wasted, so I hope you’ll trust yourself and keep pushing forward.”

She emphasized that consistent effort and self-belief are the keys to success.

Lastly, Lee Ji-hyun, the top scorer in the finance category of the legislative exam, wanted to express her gratitude to the many people who supported her during her preparation journey. We listened to her heartfelt thanks.

“There are so many people I’m grateful for during my preparation,” she said. “To all the study group members at Gwanjeong who struggled and thrived alongside me and gave me strength, the new people I met at Sparta, the finance category passers who joined me for interview study sessions, and everyone who went through this journey with me—I learned so much and drew immense strength from you throughout. I also want to thank all my friends who cheered me on and told me I’d succeed, as well as my high school teachers who continued to support me even after graduation. I’m grateful to my boyfriend, who always stood by me and hung out with me every Sunday. Finally, I want to express my deep gratitude to my grandmother and relatives who always cheered me on, my kind younger brother who always listened to his older sister, and my parents, who supported and encouraged me from the start of my studies to the very end.”

Lee highlighted how the support and encouragement from those around her were a tremendous source of strength, conveying her sincere gratitude. Her thanks will surely resonate with many who rejoice in and cheer for her success.

Moreover, her remarkable achievements at a young age spark anticipation for her future endeavors. Witnessing the emergence of a new talent who will shape the nation’s future warms the heart.

Lee Ji-hyun (24) · Top Scorer in the Finance Category of the 40th Legislative Examination in 2024  
Graduate of Gyeonggi Academy of Foreign Languages · Currently enrolled in the Department of Agricultural Economics and Social Sciences at Seoul National University  

Source: Legal Journal (http://www.lec.co.kr)