Design and Skill Labs: Identifying Teacher Competencies and Competency-Related Needs in Turkey’s National Makerspace Project

By 2023 in Turkey, Design and Skills Labs (DSL) are planned to be run in public schools by the Ministry of National Education. At this point, teachers' qualifications that are in charge of working there are ambiguous. The aim of the study is to ascertain teachers' necessary competencies and competency-based needs in these places. This study employed mixed-method research design. In this respect, sequential exploratory design was exploited, in which the qualitative phase takes part in the first place and the qualitative data inform the subsequent quantitative steps. So firstly, interviews were conducted with 10 educators working in private and non-profit makerspaces to understand and to determine their necessary competencies. The interviews took place at participants' workplaces (except one). The data were analyzed on a computer program. Through the analysis, the themes and subthemes emerged.
Then, based on the themes and subthemes, a survey was created that was held with the teachers working at public schools to find out their competency-based needs in DSL. The survey was created and conducted online using web tools and social media. 226 participants took part in the survey. The survey data were analyzed on Microsoft Excel and SPSS.
The data of the study concluded that educators in various makerspaces mainly share technical and pedagogical skills. Further, the findings indicated that teachers who work in DSL should possess social, technical, and personal/professional skills in their environments that would increase the quality of teaching/learning and communication among learners and teachers. This study would guide the Ministry of National Education and the Council of Higher Education to provide teachers’ more comprehensive and effective professional development opportunities as well as redeveloping the educational policies both in K-12 and tertiary education.