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Original poster

Are teachers really more stressed than anyone else?

203 replies

EcoCalc · 05/01/2019 09:36

Stumbled across a news article with a teacher who said the stress was so bad she considered crashing her car just so she didn’t have to go to work. Iots of people on my Facebook feed agreeing that that was their experience.

Maybe I just don’t get it but surely teachers don’t have the monopoly on stress. I always get the impression that they feel their jobs are much worse than anyone else’s. Is it more that the personality type attracted to teaching isn’t necessarily equipped for the same levels of stress that lawyers or doctors have?

Just curious about people’s thoughts. Is teaching the MOST stressful thing in the world as it is being depicted as being?

OP posts:
abacucat · 05/01/2019 13:57

I have taught kids, but not a teacher.
Teaching is different from what it used to be. Schools are different from what they used to be. And many parents don't seem to realise this. I see it too when some HE parents talk about schools and it is clear they are talking about how schools were when they went to school, not now. Standards did have to improve in schools. But some of the demands are excessive.

TheOnlyLivingBoyInNewCross · 05/01/2019 13:57

Is it more that the personality type attracted to teaching isn’t necessarily equipped for the same levels of stress that lawyers or doctors have?

I notice you still haven't clarified what personality type that is that makes us all so feeble and easily stressed?

Racecardriver · 05/01/2019 13:59

Teachers I have known said they that were assaulted by students in some of the state schools they taught at at the beginning of their careers (one had chairs thrown at her). Doctors watch their patients die. Most lawyers I know regularly have clients who don’t pay (some even accuse them of malpractice/fraud to get out of paying). Different kinds of stress. Clearly the teacher in the article just isn’t cut out for a stressful job.

Interested in this thread?

Then you might like threads about these subjects:

General education General health
AssassinatedBeauty · 05/01/2019 14:03

Is it ever the case that teachers have too much stress placed on them, or is it usually the case that teachers are weaker than the average person and just can't hack normal work stress?

abacucat · 05/01/2019 14:03

Most other professional jobs you sack your client if they are abusive. But teachers in some areas regularly have parents and kids being abusive. They are not expelled.

Holidayshopping · 05/01/2019 14:06

Also very weary of people who make sweeping statements that are very loaded, and ultimately quite insulting, then follow it with a wide-eyed ‘just curious’ type disclaimer.

Exactly what I was thinking.

abacucat · 05/01/2019 14:13

I have been amazed at how weak and feeble some people on here think teachers are. Anyone with that type of personality would not get through their first NQT year.

MaisyPops · 05/01/2019 14:16

Is it ever the case that teachers have too much stress placed on them, or is it usually the case that teachers are weaker than the average person and just can't hack normal work stress?
It's WORK related stress. Not 'I'm pathetic and needy and into went into teaching for the holidays and can't manage holding down a normal job' stress.

Nice to know OP's goal of getting the teacher bashing, teachers can't hack it, the real world vs teaching cliches going.

BoneyBackJefferson · 05/01/2019 14:19

AssassinatedBeauty
Is it ever the case that teachers have too much stress placed on them, or is it usually the case that teachers are weaker than the average person and just can't hack normal work stress?

Define "normal work stress".

Athena51 · 05/01/2019 14:23

I just wondered if the stress seemed worse to teachers because they have more type B personalities.

Seriously? You're not teacher bashing but then you say this? I'll go and tell my maths teacher son (who has a first in maths and chose to teach because he believes in it and is brilliant at it) that his stress is caused by his substandard personality shall I?

FFS

Beerflavourednipples · 05/01/2019 14:25

I have been amazed at how weak and feeble some people on here think teachers are. Anyone with that type of personality would not get through their first NQT year.

I know. Most of the 'teachers have it so easy' people I know in real life would be chewed up and spat out before break time.

AssassinatedBeauty · 05/01/2019 14:26

BoneyBackJefferson I suppose things like targets, deadlines and workload?

abacucat · 05/01/2019 14:34

Seriously a bunch of 30 kids pick up very quickly on ANY weaknesses. A feeble person would not survive in a modern classroom.

BoneyBackJefferson · 05/01/2019 14:40

AssassinatedBeauty

Define "targets, deadlines and workload".

Are you saying that a teacher couldn't hack it as a van driver? they have "targets, deadlines and workload"?
Or are you saying that teachers couldn't cut it as engineers because they have "targets, deadlines and workload".
Nurses, Doctors, Lawyers all have "targets, deadlines and workload" yet they are all different.

To throw loose terms about makes it a nonsense.

Holidayshopping · 05/01/2019 14:44

Do you think part of the problem is that teaching isn’t really what people think? It seems like a lot of the issues are that teaching is being pushed towards being treated more like any other business? Targets and deadlines and workload

Do you realise that sounds pretty offensive?

You are suggesting that teaching is becoming like the jobs that other do but teachers just can’t hack it.

You are sounding more and more like a very poor journalist!

Rainuntilseptember · 05/01/2019 14:49

It was right that my last post was deleted as you aren’t allowed to call posters certain swear words, but come on people, if you don’t believe that the OP is being deliberately goady then you must be as thick as she obviously thinks all teachers are. Have rarely read such a series of snide digs, all done in this faux innocent way.

AssassinatedBeauty · 05/01/2019 14:50

I was responding to Racecardriver's post, asking her the question in response to her suggestion that the teacher in the article wasn't cut out for a stressful job.

MaisyPops · 05/01/2019 14:55

Rainuntilseptember
Oh it's obvious.

We could get a full house already.

  • Here's an article that I'm not going to link to but will false represent
  • I'm just wondering if ... insert exaggerated statement not from the article...
  • I'm just curious abiut your thoughts (but not in staff room or education where you could get views if genuine)
  • teachers being weak and pathetic
  • teachers can't handle normal.work pressure
  • teachers only get stressed because they're expecting 9-3 & can't cope with more
  • teachers just complain and moan
  • teachers must have a weak personality
  • teachers complain their job is becoming more like other people's

It's absolutely designed to drag out all the usual cliched poorly informed criticism

Rainuntilseptember · 05/01/2019 14:59

I know, I shouldn’t fall into the trap but it’s hard! Especially the weekend before most of us return, no coincidence with the thread timing I expect.

MaisyPops · 05/01/2019 15:00

Absolutely agree with you rain.

It's the same old bollocks though isn't it. People who don't work in schools thinking they know it all, then goad people and complain when people challenge them because 'but I was only asking... Only saying...'

Foxyloxy1plus1 · 05/01/2019 15:07

I think that the majority of teachers are very strong people and all that matters is that they are doing the job because they want to make a difference. I make no apology for that generalisation.

Racecardriver unless you’ve been in the position that the teacher in the article has been, you can’t comment on whether she should have a job that’s stressful. Anyway, surely we’ve agreed that all jobs have stress of some description. If I were that teacher, I would be very offended at the idea that I couldn’t deal with stress. But when stress is so extreme that it makes you want to cause yourself physical harm, rather than go to work, something is very wrong. It doesn’t happen on a whim. It’s an accumulation that makes it impossible to carry on.

FruitCider · 05/01/2019 15:10

Reading this thread with interest, I do empathise that teaching is a stressful job but I need to quash the claims about elevated suicide risk as it simply isn't true.

Male low skilled labour jobs eg builders have the highest suicide levels, 44% higher than average, and skilled labour eg plasterers and decorators closely follows with a 35% higher than average risk.

Females working in artistic, creative and media industries have a 65% higher risk of suicide, followed by health professions eg female nurses at 24% higher risk. Females within the teaching profession have a lower risk of suicide than the general population overall, but this spiked slightly for primary and nursery female teachers.

Farmers, vets and doctors are also at heightened risk of suicide for either gender because they have the knowledge and means to do it eg drugs, firearms.

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/articles/suicidebyoccupation/england2011to2015

Anyway, do I think teaching is stressful but I don't believe it to be more stressful than other occupations. I do feel that on MN there tends to be a position of elevating teaching to more importance than any other job eg historically when discussing salaries I was told teaching is more important that nursing as without teachers I couldn't be a nurse and that's why they deserve higher pay. Nothing to do with teaching being acceptable to men and it being pitched as a profession and not a vocation 🙄

Holidayshopping · 05/01/2019 15:19

Anyway, do I think teaching is stressful but I don't believe it to be more stressful than other occupations.

In over twenty years of teaching, I haven’t met a single teacher who has ever claimed it was.

BoneyBackJefferson · 05/01/2019 15:20

FruitCider

What was said to get that response?
Context is everything.

Tw1nsetAndPearls · 05/01/2019 16:20

Anyway, do I think teaching is stressful but I don't believe it to be more stressful than other occupations.

I have been on MN for over 15 years and a teacher for 20 years and have never heard a teacher say that it is more stressful than all other occupations

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