Analysis of Key Competencies and Curriculum Expertise of Korean Dance Programs to Assist in Their Long-Term Sustainability

Abstract

Graduate programs should be operated based on professionalism. The purpose of this study was to investigate the professionalism of thirteen doctoral dance programs in Korea. The study included thirteen doctoral programs from 10 universities in Korea. Data on the dance programs were collected using school bulletins, websites, and booklets. Educational goals, doctoral program requirements, and syllabi were analyzed based on the documents of each graduate school. Although most graduate school dance programs offered similar characteristics of courses, programs majorly comprised theory, performance, and workshops. Dance performance appeared to be an important aspect of dance programs in Korea. Interestingly, three different genres of dance (Korean folk dance, modern dance, and ballet) were overwhelmingly present in doctoral programs. This study recommended that more research- and scholastic-oriented programs should be provided in doctoral programs to enhance the fundamentals of the dance academic environment. Overall, more specialized programs are required to meet the various needs and choices of the doctoral students. It is certain that students’ interests and academic excellence are the greatest assets for doctoral dance major students. The concepts of diversity, culture, and interdisciplinary cooperation should be applied more to the description and research of graduate courses. Operationalizing these efforts through rigorous assessments of students’ mastery of key competencies in the curriculum is another evolving task for sustainable education leaders.

1. Introduction

In preparation for a knowledge-based society in the 21st century, the role and function of graduate schools are being reinforced through a focus on research, which may be a desirable response to meet the demands of the times. In the future, cultural, economic, and human exchanges between countries are likely to be more frequent, and as already seen in Europe, even national boundaries may be removed. From this point of view, the field of dance will also play a catalytic role in cultural and artistic exchanges between countries. Given this backdrop, while knowledge and techniques are important in the field of dance, the development of programs that cultivate insightful leaders is also crucial to the education provided through graduate school dance majors [1,2].

In Korea’s graduate school dance education, a master’s course at Kyunghee University was opened in 1972, and a doctoral course at Yongin University was opened in 1999. Currently, many dance professionals are trained every year through 60 master’s and doctoral programs in 35 graduate schools. As the number of graduate students majoring in dance increases, the demand by society for greater clarity on the roles and responsibilities of graduate schools is becoming more evident, but it has been noted that the graduate school curriculum lacks expertise and is not future-oriented to cultivate dance professionals [3,4]. For example, it was found that the curriculum objectives were presented in an overly general manner as content advocating for human resource training in graduate school courses, and additionally, the specification of dance classes was unclear [5]. In addition, there was a lack of opportunities to experience dance practice and choreography, and dance majors were not specialized, which weakened the possibility of employment [6,7].

Until the end of the late 1990s, dance departments in graduate schools have increased their number of programs, but only in terms of professionalism and specification; dance was not able to escape from the undergraduate level and the programs did not help in finding a career path. This was because only a very small number of dance graduates could have professional dance-related jobs [8]. It has been reported that this phenomenon is similar in Europe, Australia [9,10,11,12], and the United States [1]. In fact, the graduate program of the dance major meets the needs of various students and artistic achievement and teaching–learning, the balance between theory and performance. In addition, multicultural and multidisciplinary approaches and the use of technology should be applied to the development and practice of dance [2,13]. However, in reality, the application of all these goals to the dance curriculum is not properly reflected. In Korea, even though the doctoral course in dance has been offered, which has been the best higher education curriculum since 2000, the same problem of dance graduates not securing professional dance-related employment has been raised, and voices attempting to solve the problem are growing [14]. However, it would be practically challenging to provide a wide range of curriculum that can reflect the professional interests of graduate students such as dance directing, performance planning, dance education, and choreography. It is unclear whether this is a problem unique to Korea, whether it is due to the socio-cultural background of the dance world itself, or if it is because the academic boundary is unclear, so continuous interest and research are required. In particular, the issue of the validity of a graduate school education for dance majors has been constantly pointed out. Likewise, it is necessary to review and re-examine from fundamental perspectives whether the goals, roles, and functions of the graduate school curriculum are operating normally.

As part of this effort, there are studies [3,5,15] that describe the educational goals and curriculum of universities that offer doctoral programs in dance in Korea. However, rather than examining the values and standards of dance programs as specialized programs, previous studies have simply introduced and compared the subjects. Operationalizing these efforts through rigorous assessments of students’ mastery of key competencies in the curriculum is another evolving task for sustainable education leaders. Although the number of sustainability programs in higher education has grown significantly [15,16], not much attention has been given to the dance education for sustainability development programs in Korea. Therefore, it is necessary to prepare a plan for understanding and practicing education for sustainability development. From this perspective, several frameworks of competencies in sustainability [17,18,19,20] can provide meaningful insights for future Korean dance programs in higher education.

It is necessary to further analyze the composition of doctoral dance programs and their role in performance in order to arrive at concrete directions for improvement. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to analyze graduate programs by categorizing 13 doctoral programs in dance at 10 universities based on the educational goals, theory, performance, and characteristics of each course, including practice.

2. Materials and Methods

Sample and Data Collection

The sample included 13 doctoral dance programs identified between 2019 and 2020 from the National Statistic Annual Report for Education. All university curriculum information was sourced primarily from department websites, institution catalogs, and bulletins. Currently, Ph.D. courses related to Korean dance majors are offered at ten graduate schools, mainly in Seoul, Gyeonggi-do, and Chungcheong-do. Degrees are titled Doctor of Dance, Doctor of Convergence Contents of Dance, Doctor of Performing Arts, Doctor of Arts Management, and Doctor of Philosophy.

Table 1. Current status of doctoral colleges and degrees in dance-related majors in Korea.

University	Location	Departments	Degrees
DDU	Seoul	Dance Convergence Contents	Dr. of Dance Convergence Contents
DKU	Yongin	Dance	Dr. of Dance
EHU	Seoul	Dance	Dr. of Dance
HYU	Seoul(1)	Dance	Dr. of Ph. D
	Ansan(2)	Department of Performing Arts	Dr. of Ph. D
CAU	Anseong	Department of Performing Arts (1)	Dr. of Dept of Performing Arts
		Dance (Technique,2)	Dr. of Dance
KHU	Seoul	Department of Performing Arts	Dr. of Dance, Arts Management
			Dr. of Dance
SKKU	Seoul	Dance	Dr. of Dance
SMU	Seoul	Dance	Dr. of Dance
SJU	Seoul	Dance	Dr. of Dance
CNU	Daejeon	Dance	Dr. of Dance
10 universities in total	6 cities and provinces	12 courses	13 degrees

shows the current descriptive details of 13 doctoral curriculums in dance-related majors at 10 universities for data collection. The three university programs at HYU, CAU, and KHU offer dual graduate dance programs.

The methodology for this study was frequency analysis. In this study, frequency analysis was used to clarify our basic understanding of the key aspects of the doctoral dance programs phenomenon in Korea. The data collected for this study were compared for each individual course description in each graduate school curriculum to confirm the current course objectives and the validity of the course. If the contents of the curriculum or educational purpose were ambiguous, the person in charge of the department was called directly to gather a supplementary explanation of the course and arrive at an improved understanding of the course. The data collected through the website or the graduate school’s brochure were organized by course name for each category (theory and performance), and the validity of the course content was cross-checked to see whether the syllabus included the learning content or not. The validity check was conducted between the researcher and the research assistant.

The doctoral degree curriculum of each graduate school was divided into broad categories of theory and performance based on educational goals and objectives and types of classes. The sub-category ‘theory’ was divided into research, seminars, papers, and the general course, and the sub-category ‘performance’ was divided into Korean dance, modern dance, ballet, workshops, and other (foreign dance, dance for all).

All courses included in the study have been classified by course name. That is, within the sub-category ‘research’, courses that included the term ‘research’ in the course name have been included. For example, subjects marked as ‘Dance Psychology Research’ and ‘Dance Culture History Research’ have been categorized within the research sub-category; lectures containing ‘seminar’ in their lecture/course name such as ‘Dance Therapy Seminar,’ ‘Motion Analysis Seminar,’ etc., were designated to the sub-category ‘seminar’. The category of thesis refers to a course that can promote research ability. Subjects such as Dance Research Methodology, Research Methodology, Thesis Research I–II, and Dissertation I–IV have been categorized into lectures that are marked by the sub-category ‘thesis’. In particular, the characteristics of thesis-related courses were judged based on whether an opportunity to cultivate research ability and thesis writing ability, which are essential elements of a doctoral degree program, was provided.

In addition, university names have been indicated by acronym to protect their identities and maintain objectivity.

3. Data Analysis

A descriptive analysis was conducted by deriving simple frequencies and percentages for each category. Based on the extracted data by recording the lecture name of the graduate school curriculum and the keywords of the subject content, similar contents were grouped and frequency was checked. To determine the reliability of the categorization among researchers, the researcher, one professor in the dance department, and two graduate students in the dance doctoral course conducted an independent category extraction using 10% of the sample, and the reliability at this time was over 92%. Three inter-researcher reliability tests (X1 = 91%, X2 = 89%, X3 = 92%) were conducted to prevent a decrease in reliability among researchers during the data analysis.

4. Results

4.1. Goals/Objectives

Table 2. Classification of educational goals of doctoral dance programs in Korea.

	Key Terms	Outstanding/ Competent Talent	Professional Dancer	Human Society /Cultural Development
School
DDU			o	o
DKU		o		o
EHU			o
HYU(1)		o	o	o
HYU(2)		o	o
CAU(1)			o	o
CAU(2)			o
KHU		o	o	o
SKKU			o	o
SMU		o	o	o
SJU		o	o
CNU			o
Total		6(24)	11(44)	8(32)

shows the analysis results of the educational goals of 12 doctoral curriculums in Korea. It has been shown that most graduate school curriculums have similar educational goals. As a result of extracting and analyzing the educational goals of 12 doctoral curricula at 10 domestic graduate schools by key word, it was found that 10 schools set the educational goal of ‘cultivating professional dancers with both theory and practical skills’ (n = 10, 83.3%). Subsequently, there were eight graduate schools with the goal of ‘contributing to the development of human society and culture’ (n = 8, 66.6%) and seven schools (n = 7, 58.3%) with the goal of ‘producing excellent or competent human resources’ as their educational goal. The total number of educational goals exceeds 12, since most of the graduate programs listed more than one educational goal. Unlike other graduate schools, KHU, HYU(1), and SMU present comprehensive goals that include all three educational goals.

4.2. Program Characteristics

As shown in

Table 3. Analysis of course types by graduate school.

Division School Name	Theory	Performance	Total Courses (%)
DDU	50	8	58
	(86.21)	(13.79)	(100.00)
DKU	44	12	56
	(78.57)	(21.42)	(100.00)
EHU	47	16	63
	(74.60)	(25.40)	(100.00)
HYU(1)	40	1	41
	(97.59)	(2.44)	(100.00)
HYU(2)	44	0	44
	(100.00)	(0.00)	(100.00)
CAU(1)	22	0	22
	(100.00)	(0.00)	(100.00)
CAU(2)	36	19	55
	(65.45)	(34.54)	(100.00)
KHU	67	0	67
	(100.00)	(0.00)	(100.00)
SKKU	25	3	28
	(89.28)	(10.71)	(100.00)
SMU	36	2	38
	(94.73)	(5.26)	(100.00)
SJU	35	0	35
	(100.00)	(0.00)	(100.00)
CNU	27	0	27
	(100.00)	(00.00)	(100.00)
Total	473	61	534
	(88.58)	(11.42)	(100.00)

, the doctoral curriculum in dance was largely divided into theory and practice. The total number of courses was 534, of which 473 courses were theoretical (88.58%) and 61 courses included practical skills (11.42%). Among them, HYU (2), CAU(1), SJU, and CNU had lectures centered on theoretical subjects, and practical lectures were not conducted at all.

Table 4. Characteristics of lecture by type of theory.

Division School Name	The Number of Theory Courses				Theoretical Course/ Total Courses (%)
	Study	Seminar	Thesis	General
DDU	16	2	2	30	50/58
	(27.59)	(3.45)	(3.45)	(51.72)	(86.21)
DKU	27		2	15	44/56
	(48.21)		(3.57)	(26.79)	(78.57)
EHU	23	6		18	47/63
	(36.51)	(9.52)		(28.57)	(74.6)
HYU(1)	11	4	3	22	40/41
	(26.83)	(9.75)	(7.32)	(53.66)	(97.56)
HYU(2)	9	3	4	28	44/44
	(20.45)	(6.82)	(9.09)	(63.64)	(100)
CAU(1)	4		1	17	22/22
	(18.18)		(4.55)	(77.27)	(100)
CAU(2)	2	3		31	36/55
	(3.64)	(5.45)		(56.36)	(65.45)
KHU	14	8		45	67/67
	(20.90)	(11.94)		(67.16)	(100)
SKKU	10	3		12	25/28
	(35.71)	(10.71)		(42.86)	(89.28)
SMU	7	2		27	36/38
	(18.42)	(5.26)		(71.05)	(94.73)
SJU	9	5	4	17	35/35
	(25.71)	(14.29)	(11.43)	(48.57)	(100)
CNU	7	3		17	27/27
	(25.93)	(11.11)		(62.96)	(100)
Total	139	39	16	279	473/534
	(26.03)	(7.30)	(3.0)	(52.25)	(88.58)

shows the results of examining the detailed characteristics of the lecture type ‘theory’. General lectures consisted of 279 lectures (52.23%), followed by 139 research lectures (26.03%), and 39 seminars (7.30%). It was confirmed that ‘thesis’ consists of 16 lectures (3.0%).

As for the characteristics of each school, DKU includes 27 courses (48.21%) in the study, and EHU includes 23 courses (36.51%). On the other hand, CAU operates two doctoral programs, and research-related lectures account for a very small percentage, four (18.18%) and two (3.64%), respectively. SJU provides 48.57% general lectures, 25.71% research, and 14.29% seminars, confirming a balanced course with 11.43% thesis writing. It was found that other SKKU, SMU, and DKU curriculums also provide research, seminars, general lectures, and lectures related to thesis writing at a relatively balanced ratio. However, at DDU graduate school, the proportion of general lectures was the highest at 51.72%, and at KHU (2), CNU, and SMU, general lectures exceeded 60%, showing more focus. There are fewer seminar-related courses offered at each graduate school, but two graduate schools were found that did not offer any seminar-related courses.

Thesis-related courses where one can directly practice and develop research skills comprised four courses at SJU Graduate School (Research Methods in Dance I, II, Dissertation I-IV) and four at HYU (2) Graduate Schools (Theory of Research Methods I, II, Thesis Topic Research, Data Analysis in Dance). However, most other graduate schools had only one or two thesis-related courses and six graduate schools did not have any thesis-related courses at all.

As shown in

Table 5. Characteristics of lectures for practical skills.

Division School Name	Number of Practical Courses					Practical Courses/Total Courses (%)
	Korean	Modern	Ballet	Others	Workshop
DDU			2	2	4	8/58
			(3.45)	(3.45)	(6.89)	(13.79)
DKU	4	4	4			12/56
	(7.14)	(7.14)	(7.14)			(21.42)
EHU	4	3	4		5	16/63
	(6.35)	(4.76)	(6.35)		(7.94)	(25.4)
HYU(1)					1	1/41
					(2.44)	(2.44)
HYU(2)						0/44
						(0)
CAU(1)						0/22
						(0)
CAU(2)	8	3	3	4	1	19/55
	(14.55)	(5.45)	(5.45)	(7.27)	(1.82)	(34.54)
KHU						0/67
						(0)
SKKU	1	1	1			3/28
	(3.57)	(3.57)	(3.57)			(10.71)
SMU	2					2/38
	(5.26)					(5.26)
SJU						0/35
						(0)
CNU						0/27
						(0)
Total	19	11	14	6	11	61/534
	(3.56)	(2.06)	(2.62)	(1.12)	(2.06)	(11.42)

, the detailed characteristics of lecture-type practical skills were classified. Five universities did not offer any practical courses, while seven universities offered 61 courses, accounting for 11.42% of the total number of courses. In the practical field, Korean dance was most frequently offered with 19 lectures (3.56%), ballet was offered through 14 lectures (2.62%), and 11 lectures for modern dance were offered (2.06%). Other than these, there were only six lectures in two schools where other dances such as daily life dance and foreign dance were offered.

5. Discussion

As a result of analyzing the thirteen Korean graduate school dance major programs, they include contents such as ‘producing competent talents’, ‘professional dancers who have both theory and performance skills’, and ‘contribution to human society/culture development’. However, these statements are so general and comprehensive that they need to be turned into more actionable and specific goals. Although Korean dance scholars have emphasized the necessity of interrelationships between the major goals and curriculum, and the re-establishment of goals tailored to individualization, specialization, and characteristics of each graduate school, not much has been improved. From this point of view, the perspectives for the development of dance in the East and the West are in harmony. Currently, it is pointed out that the doctoral programs in dance majors in Korea do not have specific achievement standards to achieve educational goals, and the evaluation of achievement is unclear and ambiguous [5,14]. The reason why the doctoral programs’ educational goals should be changed to more specific and clear statements is that when specific educational goals are established, deliberate plans and changes in education tailored to the needs of society and students become possible. In the United States, as the National Association of Schools of Dance (NASD) established benchmarks in 1981 to maintain a minimum level of academic achievement, it is necessary to actively consider the introduction of such a system in Korea. Sara Gibb [21] reaffirmed the vital importance of maintaining the dance discipline at the core of our educational mission. The 2020–21 NASD Handbook provides the basis for enhancing the comprehensive excellence of the graduate school dance program as follows [22].

Opportunities and Relationships. Graduate programs in dance should provide opportunities for individual students to enlarge their breadth of competence. This includes opportunities for deepening understanding of the relationships among dance specializations such as performance, choreography, history, and pedagogy.

It should be remembered that the establishment of clear goals determines the direction and method of education, the environment, and the level of learning, and by confirming the results, one can plan a better future for education. Wiek et al. [18] explained that normative competence, which is the ability to collectively map, specify, apply, and negotiate sustainability values, principles, goals, and targets, is important for constructing direction and orientation about deliberative change.

As a result of analyzing the types and detailed characteristics of courses in dance-related graduate schools in this study, it was found that more than half of the courses in dance graduate schools in Korea belong to the general course category. Although the weight of each graduate school is different, it was found that the most emphasis was placed on general knowledge transfer. This study calls for the establishment and efficiency of courses that can improve research ability in the curriculum. In terms of balance by course, the offering of research (26.03%) or seminars (7.30%) seems appropriate in quantity, but the opening of thesis-related courses (n = 16, 3.0%) aimed at developing full-fledged research skills is very small.

Although the development of dance studies can be expected by equipping basic research performance through graduate education, there is no improvement in this area. The reason might be that there are insufficient courses related to statistical methods and quantitative and qualitative research methods, and there is also a shortage of specialized personnel who can take charge of them [11]. In the end, dance academia is focused on performance [1,18]. Therefore, it is considered to have weaknesses in theoretical education. In order to compensate for this, other majors receive support for courses related to research conduct, but in reality, most lectures are only titled ‘0000 Research’ or ‘0000 Seminar’. This type of course offering does not provide numerous opportunities to create and present work so that students can cultivate the knowledge and skills necessary to become the next generation of innovative dance makers, leaders, teaching-artists, and artist-scholars. A role as a functionally linked complex of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that enables successful work and problem solving in relation to real sustainability issues, challenges, and opportunities is needed in the Ph.D. program [17,18,19,20]. In other words, the core sustainability competencies should be a curriculum that builds students’ skills and challenges to tackle sustainability.

Looking at the current situation of dance majors, it is expressed as “scarcity, deficiency, and decline [22]” for reasons such as budget reduction, faculty shortage, student reduction, practical-oriented bias, and closure of master’s and doctorate courses. As such, the status of dance science is in danger of shrinking. This phenomenon does not arise from a single cause, but in order to prevent this and stay faithful to an education in dance, education with high relevance at a graduate school level must be guaranteed. In this situation, Kahlich [23] argued that a reformed and flexible program should be operated so that the role of dancers and dances continues to grow and transform with the aim of artistic, educational, and academic development. The postgraduate dance-related curriculum should focus on cultivating research performance, practical skills, and knowledge exploration, not just a list of courses.

There may be controversy about the necessity of practical training in graduate school, but it is necessary to experience and learn the teaching method through practical means and not simple performances [1].

If it is a follow-up course at the same level as a practical course in an undergraduate program, it does not fit the skills of a graduate school aiming for academic excellence and cannot be free from criticism of lack of expertise. The fact that skill-oriented performance courses are still provided in the doctoral program deepens the gap between the artistic work of dance and the academic nature. This could lead to an institutional divide, as Ross [24] argued. Therefore, it is an important task for dance professors to close the gap between dance as performance and dance as discipline within the dance major. In other words, it is because the doctoral program, which is the best higher education course, is based on balanced theory and performance skills, but focuses on cultivating academic research ability.

Finally, as a result of examining the detailed characteristics of the practical lectures in this study, eight graduate schools out of 13 dance-related majors in doctoral programs in 10 universities show a serious phenomenon in which majors consist only of three traditional genres. Most of the Korean dance fields are divided into three genres: Korean dance, ballet, and contemporary dance, so they rarely have the opportunity to learn about dances such as improvised dance, jazz dance, and musical dance [25]. This can be said to be a closed and fragmentary form that is contrary to globalization, internationalization, technology, and multicultural dance education [1], which require understanding and exchange of various dances. I strongly believe that the wide development of the Korean dance world will be halted if it cannot escape from the closedness and limitations of the three genres. In the United States, Australia, and Europe, the development of dance has been promoted in various ways through academic efforts such as Summary of Dance 1990 and Beyond-Future Trends for the development of dance. Schmitz [26] argued that the importance of graduate school is “to improve teacher education: postpone teacher education until graduate school”. Schmitz’s ideas later had a great influence on teacher education in Australia. At the same time, LaPonte [27] asserted “the unilateral Eurocentric vision of dance as a theater art”, and socio-cultural issues related to dance received attention. In the dance major, of course, based on the pure art dance of Korean dance, contemporary dance, and ballet for dance professionals, jazz dance, improvisational dance, musical dance, dance sports, and folk dance of each country are for both professionals and the general public. With reference to the current situation of graduate school dance education in Korea, what implications can be conveyed in the case of other countries? Based on the results of this study, it will be meaningful to examine the unique status of higher dance education in other countries and to determine the direction of future education. Although this study was only targeting higher dance education programs in Korea, it is not possible to know exactly how different countries will appear. However, if it is not significantly different from the results of this study, it will be possible to take a partner’s path in deciding the direction for better future dance education based on the results of this study.

UNESCO (2017) proposed a new competency related to “Education for Sustainable Development Goals: Learning Goals”. This defines “self-awareness” as “the ability to reflect one’s role in the community and in (global) society [28,29,30]” In other words, it is believed that the change in the basic curriculum, which was limited to Korean dance, ballet, and contemporary dance in the diversity of Korean dance fields, is based on this theory.

It must be accompanied by an open attitude and effort to understand and accept the diverse cultures and dances of Korea. As interdisciplinary communication and consilience are already changing the academic ecosystem, the dance field must also seek a new paradigm through consilience with various fields. In short, in future dance majors, the concepts of diversity, culture, and interdisciplinary cooperation should be applied more to the description and research of graduate courses [1].

In Korea, dance programs in higher education have provided a limited resource for the students [8,15]. In spite of a growing international community of sustainability researchers pursuing similar goals, higher education institutions in Korea do not provide responsive mentorship. Institutions lack guidance on competencies, while employers lack a trustworthy reference to compare candidates’ profiles. This lack of dance professors’ competencies causes various problems. The potential negative impact of the helpless decline in the competitiveness of dance professors is absolute. Therefore, their awakening and efforts to improve are absolutely necessary.

Competencies are not naturally developed in the teaching–learning environment; instead, they require targeted and ongoing efforts to learn about competencies through working with each competency’s set of concepts, methods, and skills. Through better understanding of the character of the competencies, the other dimensions of practice theory and their materials and meanings need further empirical exploration in the context of sustainability education and the professionalized practice of sustainability in Korea. A key implication for practice is to offer faculty development programs and to build a shared literacy around key competencies in sustainability. Graduate schools need to introduce graduate students to available sources and should support aspiring sustainability researchers focused on all dimensions of well-being as part of their professional development. In order to overcome this, it is necessary to actively introduce sustainability in the dance major programs in Korea. Adoption of sustainability education professional development programs that offer a multitude of benefits [21] is critical and contributes to faculty and academic staff developing sustainability teaching competencies.

6. Conclusions

This study provided the following conclusions based on an analysis of twelve doctoral dance curriculum across ten universities in Korea. First, the educational objectives of the 12 Korean dance major doctoral degree curriculums were mostly aimed at producing professional dancers, but the goal statements have been found to be only comprehensive and general statements. Most of them express willingness, such as cultivation of theory and practical leadership ability and contribution to human society/culture development, but statements of specific goals are insufficient. We need thorough theoretical justifications of why the proposed goals are instrumental for competencies in sustainability educational development programs. Therefore, goal statements need to be modified to be more specific and professional statements that guarantee specialization in the major. For example, NASD’s benchmark in the United States can be a good example.

Second, the Ph.D. program in graduate school should be structured such that it expands the concept of dance rather than limiting it to general lectures on the subject. It is necessary to cultivate academic research abilities that contribute to building knowledge of dance. There is a dearth of courses that can improve academic research performance in doctoral dance courses in Korea. This fact is evidence that there is a gap between the educational goals of graduate schools and actual learning. It should be noted that the primary responsibility and mission in the postgraduate doctoral program is the pursuit of academic excellence, which can improve knowledge production, the system of dance studies, and nurture the next generation of academics. Therefore, in the current dance major graduate school curriculum, it is essential to reorganize the course to improve academic research ability. Students, educators, researchers, and administrators are calling for higher education sustainability programs to articulate how they are designed to enhance students’ academic research competence. In order to do this, it is necessary to actively introduce sustainability in the dance major programs in Korea.

Third, in the curriculum divided into theory and practical skills/performance, theoretical lectures were balanced, but practical skills and performance were divided into three genres: Korean dance, modern dance, and ballet. This limited major has a profound effect on career advancement by limiting various opportunities for dance learning, reinforcing group egoism by genre, and limiting the breadth of activities. Considering the fact that various lifestyle dances other than fine art dance are being performed in modern society, the doctoral dance programs should provide the opportunity to cultivate high-quality professionals sustainably. For this, the attitude to understanding and communicating various cultures and dances of other genres is required above all else. Having a balanced perspective across the boundaries between performance and discipline should be taught and experienced in the programs. To support students in such pursuits despite the reservations against these characteristics, higher education institutions can introduce students to available resources. Specific theories of discipline and performance have been identified, detailing activities and roles for researchers in each case. Higher education systems should support students in creating a self-care plan focused on all dimensions of wellbeing as part of their professional development.

This study is limited in that it does not explore the level of education guaranteed in each doctoral program. In order to accurately judge the faithfulness and reliability of the course, it is necessary to confirm whether lectures include content on research. In this regard, the opinions of participating Ph.D. students and faculty are important. Therefore, the current study opens up the possibility for future studies to determine the validity of the graduate-level education vis-à-vis research by including perceptions of professors and beneficiaries.