SEOUL, South Korea — Kim Chae-young attends cram school five evenings a week, toiling deep into the night. But unlike most young South Koreans who spend hours at special schools to polish their English and math, she studies slide steps and bubbly lyrics.

“I want to become a K-pop icon, one like Psy,” said Chae-young, 13, referring to the Korean rapper of the viral video “Gangnam Style.” “All these hours I spend here are my investment for that dream.”

For the past four years, she has practiced her hip-hop moves at the Def Dance Skool in Seoul, which is just one such school among thousands in South Korea. Even though there is no official tally on the number of schools teaching children and teenagers to become pop entertainers, industry officials all agree that it is on the rise. Even traditional private music and dance schools — more accustomed to teaching Bach and ballet — have switched their curriculums to get with the pop plan.

They are responding to a growing demand. In a survey by the Korea Institute for Vocational Education and Training late last year, entertainers, along with teachers and doctors, were the most popular choices for future jobs among primary, middle and high school students — a far cry from a more traditional era, when entertainment was considered an inferior profession and its practitioners belittled with the derogatory nickname “tantara.” Now, in college, pop music is one of the most coveted majors, where it’s “practical music.”