Exploring Policy Responses in Primary Education to the Impacts of Declining School-Age Population : Focusing on Keyword Network Analysis

This study explores the challenges facing elementary education and the corresponding policy directions amid structural demographic change in declining school-age populations. Using text mining and keyword network analysis, it examines policy and research discourses drawn from research reports of provincial and national education research institutes (2015–2025), domestic journal articles on declining school-age populations, and major work plans of 17 provincial offices of education. Analyses of word frequency, centrality, phi coefficient, and n-grams reveal common core agendas across all three data sets, including small schools, curriculum restructuring, integrated schools and joint curricula, utilization of closed schools, and linkages with local communities and governments. The findings suggest that sustainable elementary education requires going beyond school consolidation and teacher reduction to curriculum differentiation, stronger school–community partnerships, student-centered multi-tiered support systems, and innovation in future-oriented school and teacher education systems.