THE CONTRIBUTION OF THE USE MERDEKA MENGAJAR PLATFORM TO THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THE INDEPENDENT CURRICULUM BY TEACHERS IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS IN SOUTHERN SUB-DISTRICT OF PADANG CITY

This article aims to describe the implementation of the independent curriculum, the use of Merdeka Mengajar Platform, and the contribution of the use of Merdeka Mengajar Platform to the implementation of the independent curriculum by teachers. This type of research is quantitative correlational research. The research population is 157 teachers, of which 78 were sampled using the Proportional Stratified Random Sampling technique. Data were collected with a questionnaire of the Likert scale model that has been tested for validity and reliability. The implementation of the Independent Curriculum has been good with an average achievement rate of 88.09% of the ideal score. The use of Merdeka Mengajar Platform has been good with an average achievement rate of 86.39% of the ideal score. The data was analyzed using the Product Moment Correlation formula. The test results showed that the calculation value obtained was 0.535 greater than the table which was 0.863 at a significant level of 5%. The hypothesis test results showed a significant relationship between the two variables with a correlation coefficient of 0.863, a correlation significance test of 14.875, and a determination coefficient (R²) obtained an R² value of 0.744. This means that the contribution of Merdeka Mengajar Platform to the implementation of the Independent Curriculum is 74.4%, with the remaining 25.6% influenced by other variables that are not included in this study.