"Even If We Want to Teach, There Are No Opportunities to Learn"...46.2% of Teachers Lack Understanding of Entrepreneurship

KEA and Korea Federation of Teachers’ Associations Survey of 1,078 Teachers Nationwide

Training Completion Significantly Boosts Awareness and Willingness to Recommend Entrepreneurship

According to a survey, one out of every two elementary, middle, and high school teachers nationwide is not well informed about entrepreneurship, with the lack of educational opportunities cited as the biggest factor. As training programs related to economics and entrepreneurship contribute to enhancing teachers' expertise and willingness to guide students in starting businesses, it has been suggested that expanding such programs is urgently needed.

The Korea Economic Federation (hereafter referred to as KEF) Entrepreneurship Development Center commissioned the Korea Federation of Teachers' Associations to conduct a survey of 1,078 elementary, middle, and high school teachers nationwide on their perceptions of economic and entrepreneurial education, and announced the results on September 8th.

The Korea Entrepreneurs Association's Entrepreneurship Development Center commissioned the Korea Federation of Teachers' Associations to conduct a survey titled "Teachers' Perception on Economics and Entrepreneurship Education," released on the 8th. The survey targeted 1,078 elementary, middle, and high school teachers nationwide. Korea Entrepreneurs Association

According to the survey, 46.2% of all teachers responded that they "do not know well (38.4%)" or "do not know at all (7.8%)" about the concept of entrepreneurship, while only 13.2% answered that they "know it well." Among those who said they did not know, 51.4% cited "lack of opportunities to receive related education at school" as the primary reason.

Teachers' willingness to guide students in entrepreneurship was also found to be greatly influenced by their own level of knowledge. While 54.9% of respondents said they were willing to recommend entrepreneurship to students, among those not willing to recommend it (14.1%), the top reason, cited by 55.9%, was "because teachers themselves do not know much about starting a business and find it difficult to provide guidance."

On the other hand, teachers who had completed training programs related to economics and entrepreneurship demonstrated a 67.0% level of conceptual awareness, 1.6 times higher than those who had not (42.1%). Their willingness to recommend entrepreneurship (64.9%) was also 19 percentage points higher than those who had not completed such programs (45.9%), demonstrating the effectiveness of the training.

Teachers identified the following as key topics in line with future societal changes: for entrepreneurship training, "changes in future industries and the world of work such as artificial intelligence (AI) (53.7%)" and "ways to apply these in school education (48.4%)"; and for economic education training, "practical economic education for real-life scenarios including finance and consumption (69.6%)" and "understanding changes in industry and economy due to technological advancements (58.2%)."

Kang Han-Gyore, a teacher at Daewon International Middle School, said, "In order to expand economic and entrepreneurship education at schools, it is necessary to provide more training opportunities so that teachers can enhance their expertise in these areas."

Jeong Cheol, Director of Research and Head of the Entrepreneurship Development Center at the Korea Economic Federation, emphasized, "For students to learn economics and entrepreneurship properly at school, a systematic training program must support teachers so they can understand the changing industrial environment and have the ability to connect these topics to their classes."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.