The purpose of this study is to explore how teachers at Swedish upper secondary schools perceive the so-called value words and knowledge requirements of religious studies 1 as defined by the present curriculum for upper secondary school 2011 (Gy11) how they consider themselves to apply these value words in their teaching, and whether they consider the knowledge requirements as alegitimate basis for equivalentassessment. My studyis based oninterviewswithfour teachers in religious studies at four different upper swcondary schools in the municipalityof Jönköping, Sweden. The results of my study show that the interviewed teachers perceive the value words in the knowledge requirements of religious studies 1,as defined by the present curriculum Gy11, aredifficult to interpret and that the value wordsare not definitive, but interpretable. All teachers use the knowledge requirements in theirplanning of teaching,but also in teaching where they are to concretize the knowledge requirements and value wordsthrough their own examples. Half of the teachers, however, experienced a lack of interest in the knowledge requirements by the pupils, which make it even more important to discuss knowledge requirementswith them, while the teachers’assessment has to rely on these knowledge requirements. All teachers apply the knowledge requirementsin their assessments, but three of the interviewees perceive the knowledge requirementsas unfavorable or unfair, since the knowledgerequirements and the present curriculum, Gy11expressa view of knowledge,whichaccording to several teachers,emphasizes qualitative rather than quantitative aspects. The knowledge requirements are considered as a basis for equivalentassessment to some degree, but full equivalence is not possible since the guiding documents can always be interpreted in multiple ways by the teachers. More importantly, the interviewed teachersin this study emphasized the importance oftime to discuss knowledgerequirements and assessment with colleagues, which could increase the chances of more equivalence.The results of this studycontribute withnew empiricalinsight into howteachers in religious studiesperceive,useandconsider based onthe knowledge requirementsinreligious studies1, in the the present cirruculum Gy11, andif they perceivethe knowledgerequirements as the basis forequivalentassessment.