Effects of Teachers’ Interest in the 2015 National Curriculum on the Intention to Participate in Professional Development

Assuming that a successful implementation of a newly revised curriculum requires adequate teacher competency, which needs to be cultivated through in-service education, this study seeks to analyze the effects of teachers’ interest in 2015 national curriculum on their intention to participate in the professional development activities. The responses of a total of 3,471 secondary school teachers across Korea, which were collected via on-line survey utilizing questionnaire developed by the research team were analyzed via descriptive statistics, t-test, one-way ANOVA, and hierarchical regression. We find that teachers show relatively higher interest in the 2015 national curriculum. Especially, the interest level of school administrators and master teachers is higher than younger and less experienced teachers. In addition, teachers’ intention to participate in the 2015 curriculum related in-service education is considerably strong, while teachers with higher position and working at schools in rural area show higher response tendency. Finally, there is a statistically significant relationship between the teachers’ interest in the curriculum and their intention to participate in the professional development. Based on the findings, we discussed the importance of teacher’s interest in a newly revised curriculum for its successful implementation, and draw some policy recommendations to revitalize teachers’ interest as well as participation in professional development activities.