Baekdu Hagwon had its beginning in March 1946, when, as a cultural project of the Baekdu Association, the Keonguk Industrial School and Keonguk Higher Girls' School were founded.

On 15 August 1945, when World War II ended, there were no fewer than two million Koreans living in Japan, many of whom had come there out of a need to make a living or as forced-labor draftees. For this reason, they rejoiced in the Liberation of 15 August, and Japan was filled with exuberantly celebrating Koreans. However, the Korean peninsula was divided in half, Japan itself suffered privations, and people struggled to live; society was disordered, and Koreans in Japan lived in extreme instability. At this time, the issue of educating Korean-Japanese children became serious.

Against this background, it was the founder, Cho Kyuhoon, and the first principal, Lee Kyongtae, who stepped up with concern about the future of the Korean-Japanese society and intent to provide true education to its growing children. Cho Kyuhoon founded the "Baekdu Association" as a cultural group, and brought in the intellectual Lee Kyongtae. They shared the educational view that "humans must have recognized credentials in society, and that the basis of education in particular is of no party or clique and unswayed by politics, and that the school must be recognized not only by Japanese society but by the world."

The time came, and when the old Japan School of Communications in Oriono, Sumiyoshi Ward, Osaka was abolished, the Baekdu Association bought it up and, in March of 1946, opened Baekdu Hagwon as a cultural project. At the time, they established the Industrial School as a way to give Korean-Japanese children technical skills, and the Higher Girls' School to produce intelligent and moral female students, that is women who were good wives and wise mothers at home and talented in society. The school name became "Keonguk" (country-building) on the lofty principle of "building the motherland," and the two schools were christened Keonguk Industrial School and Keonguk Higher Girls' School.

A year later, in 1947, the 6-6-3 plan was adopted nationwide, and Keonguk Junior High School was established; the Industrial School and the Higher Girls' School were amalgamated, and 300 students entered the newly coeducational school. Since these students would enter high school in three years, the high school was established in March 1948, and thus Keonguk High School opened. (From the 60th Anniversary Memorial Book of Baekdu Hagwon).

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