At this point in the novel coronavirus pandemic, it’s abundantly clear—if it somehow wasn’t pre-pandemic—that educators are overworked, underpaid, and asked to balance too many needs, desires, and priorities all while trying to teach young people. Burnout has long been associated with teaching, and especially so for teachers who serve particularly at-need or at-risk student populations. It’s exhausting work with little public recognition and a whole lot of off-the-clock labor in order to make ends meet.
And since the pandemic, teachers have gone virtual, gone hybrid, and been assaulted by parents over mask-wearing requirements. It’s a nightmare. So it’s no wonder that, as reported by NPR, the president of the National Education Association (NEA) says more than half of teachers want to retire early or leave teaching, according to a recent poll.
As some background, this pill was conducted between Jan. 14 and Jan. 24, 2022. It included 3,621 NEA members who have not yet retired. There is a 1.6% margin of error.
Becky Pringle, who serves as the NEA President, feels poll results reinforce the concept that teachers are seriously burning out in the short term, and this may result in a long-term issue of having a shortage of teachers available. In comparison to folks looking to leave teaching last year, the 55% who want to find a way out now is a considerable climb—last August, according to Pringle, that number sat at 33%. Notably, the number is higher among teachers of color, coming in at 62% of Black teachers and 59% of Latinx teachers.
Interestingly, there was an about equal desire to leave the profession no matter how senior the person was—people who were new to teaching felt the same desire to retire early as those who had been in the education world for decades.
The biggest issue is pay, but that’s not all. Teachers are worried about their students, and specifically, their students’ mental health. They advocate for hiring more teachers, counselors, and mental health professionals to help students. Hiring more staff is critical if we want teachers to be able to focus on their own job and not burn themselves out filling gaps left in the system; for example, 80% of survey respondents said they’d seen more work on their plates because of unfilled job openings.
All of this said Pringle pointed out that the issue of teachers being overworked is a chronic one, not
“We were very concerned at the decline in the number of college students who were choosing to go into the teacher preparation frame,” Pringle explained to local outlet WCSC. “And now we have the pandemic which made everything so much worse.”
In terms of COVID-19 specifically, 90% of respondents reported feeling burned out. In terms of concerns in the classroom, 95% of respondents said they wanted better ventilation in schools—and only 28% said they feel their school’s current system protects them enough. In teachers that serve majority Black and brown populations, only 21% feel their schools offer adequate ventilation. Concerningly, more than one-third of respondents say school policies have eased when it comes to mask-wearing at school, even in spite of the latest variant surge.
“We must compensate teachers and all of our educators in a way that is commensurate with the important work,” Pringle continued, saying that it’s up to people in both school boards and the state and federal government to offer support and funding to improve the education system and better protect and compensate teachers.
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