Proposing and Applying a Medium-To-Long-Term Teacher Demand Projection Model at the Local Education Office Level

Local education offices cannot set teacher supply and demand policies independently of the Ministry of Education. These offices conduct student placement based on the teacher quota set by the ministry for each local education office. They adjust the number of students per class, organize classes by grade and school, and assign teachers, taking into account facilities, teacher supply, and demand in a comprehensive way. In the medium to long term, it is also necessary to manage the size of new hires in order to maintain stable teacher retention. In this study, we have attempted to project the demand for teachers at the local education office level through 2042. We believe that the demand for teachers should be viewed from a medium- to long-term perspective, even taking into account the decline in the school-age population at the city and provincial levels. To make an accurate and reliable projection of teacher demand, we considered policy variables that affect the supply and demand of teachers, such as the number of students and the number of students per class, curriculum revision, and the introduction of the high school credit system. In addition, we proposed a method of assigning classes and staffing them by equalizing the number of students in each class. We projected the number of students per grade by school, and based on that, projected the number of classes and teachers. To do this, we developed an equation for calculating the number of teachers needed and modeled the relationship between the two variables based on the number of classes and teachers per school in 2022 from the National Education Information System. The paper concludes that the difference between the average number of students per class and the same number of students in each class is significant, and that the demand for teachers may vary significantly depending on the appropriate class size and the degree of change in educational conditions. The results also suggest that it is necessary to consider the appropriate class size and improve the method of projecting the number of students and teachers to estimate the number of teachers.