In an effort to improve the quality of child care services, policy-makers and child care
workforce have strived to figure out which issues or strategies have the most priorities and
feasibility in order to enhance the professionalism of child care teachers. This study aimed
to deeply investigate the legislation and status of child care teachers qualification and
training requirements, specifically through the concept of professionalism. The exploratory
research gathered the opinions of child care professionals-college professors and instructors
of child care teacher training centers, through two-step Delphi study questionnaires for the
108 child care professional personnel. It compared their agreements and disagreements
concerning the impending issues of teachers’ education, qualifications, and salary/working
conditions of teachers, and also identified the legal and societal factors pertaining to the preand
in-service training requirements and processes, supply and demand of child care
teachers, in order to improve the quality of child care services.
The results have shown that the highest figure of necessity concerning the teacher
education was on the department-based education system (4.61/5.0 point scale), increase of
required subjects over 35 credits(4.39), and the evaluations on the CDA training centers(4.39).
Also the differentiated enforcement of required work experiences and time requirement
according to the educations and qualifications of teachers, especially in becoming center
director and promoting with first-class teacher qualification. The betterment of salary and
working conditions of child care teachers were consistently high in the figures of necessity
ratings.
Comparatively the recognition of feasibility for the prolonged field practicum(3.30) and the
abolishment of CDA child care teacher training center(3.54), were low compared to the
recognition of necessity for those improvement. The most feasible issues were the application
of common standardized education curriculum(3.88) for all child care teacher credentials, the
increase in the required credits(3.77), and the intensification of field practicum process(3.72).
Secondly, the feasibility of introduction of national qualification examination and the
on-the-job-training for the entering teachers were low due to the non-converging division of
opinions among professional respondents. Specifically the improvement of working
conditions and the betterment of salaries were very high in the necessity ratings of
professional respondents, but low in the feasibility ratings, presumably due to the redundant
failures or neglect of the policy implementation with reasons of lacking in financial budget.
Nevertheless the child care experts' opinions for the child care teacher professionalism
have converged on the two main themes through two-step Delphi questionnaires: (1) the
education and credentials of child care teachers, and (2) the salaries and working conditions.
This study implies the policy implementation for the professionalism of child care workforce
has shared common strategies and steps with priorities. They are (1) the intensification of
teacher education curriculum and the acquisition process of higher teacher qualification such
as director and first class credentials, and (2) the improvement of working conditions with 8
hours working a day, and raised salaries applying the extra-hours benefits.