Nearly half of teachers plan to quit in the next 5 years

[freebritknee]

I saw this from a survey carried out by an education union.

Unmanageable workload is a significant factor.

This is madness how have the unions allowed the state of teachers employment to get this far where nearly half of them want out?!

@mrshoho

Do you realise the damage you are doing to the reputation of the teaching profession by using that term 'fall back option'? It's the attitude that I believe many in government have. How ironic that you are commenting on a thread debating the reasons why so many teachers are thinking of leaving. Why single out teaching as being a fallback option?

Because it’s true. Teaching is a fallback option for loads of degrees. I’d argue it’s much more damaging to the profession to pretend there’s nothing wrong with the current offering of a teaching career.

@noblegiraffe

I think we are heading for a crisis here, surely.

We've been at a crisis point for years, but because Gove allowed unqualified teachers into schools, children aren't being sent home because there is no one suitable to teach them.

I was thinking earlier about how people are far more aware of the crisis in the NHS than in schools, and it's because of this issue. If there isn't a surgeon, your operation is cancelled. We know about the cancellations and huge waiting lists. We know about the missed targets. We know when we can't see a doctor and we know when we are given an appointment with a nurse instead.

Where are the government targets for children to be taught by a qualified teacher? Targets for children to be taught by a permanent teacher rather than a string of supply teachers? There aren't any, and when this happens to children, parents are generally not even told. The cracks are not visible.

The country massively ran out of teachers this term just gone because of covid. Schools couldn't get hold of supply teachers for love nor money. Tens of thousands of children were sent home in partial school closures. Many, many other children were sat in halls in collapsed classes being supervised while watching documentaries or doing other busywork to keep them occupied till a lesson where a teacher was actually available.

Did it make the news?

I absolutely agree. The problems in teaching have been too long focused on ‘how difficult it is to be a teacher’ instead of ‘here’s exactly what’s happening to your kid’s education’, and that needs to change.

@SamphirethePogoingStickerist Understandably. But as someone coming from a corporate background but married to a teacher, it's a sensible question - ie if things are so crap, why don't schools change them? Why don't they do things differently? I think it's hard to see from the outside how difficult it is for schools (even SMT, let alone teachers), to change things for the better when they're working within the the framework of state education. I've seen this at my own kids' school with bright-eyed, corporate-background governors who come in determined to change things for the better, but are forced to throw up their hands and admit defeat when they run up against the limitations of the system.

Depends on what for the better means. I have been aovernor. Sometimes the corporate background ones had no clue at all about education and schools.

In terms of schools changing things, you have to question who it is the glorious MAT leaders want to please and who they think they work for. Clue: not the staff and not really the pupils either. The DfE is very good at ignoring more campaigning HTs.

Sounds like SMT are a huge part of the problem

A surprising number of my SLT are proper Tories... or apolitical.

Education is an enormous and immovable edifice. There is nothing any individual can do within the system. even those who set up outside it are now struggling as their initial freedoms are being eroded.

The absolutely worst part of it all is that NOTHING that is done, added, changed, makes the outcomes for a significant % of kids any better. It just gives them more stressed teachers who are less and less able to do what they want to do, teach, nurture, make learning fun.

As others have said, this is not how education works in many other places. But the edifice refuses to crumble and nobody has the bravery to call a halt to it.

@MichaelAndEagle thank you for actually taking the time to read the linked post. @Covidwoes I never fail to be amazed by the number of people who overreact without taking the time to read or understand what someone has said. If you’d like to challenge the data please go ahead but please read it first.

To the poster who asked if I’m a civil servant, no I’m not. I’m an ex teacher but moved into research to pursue a subject I am passionate about. And it’s not education, but education comes into our work a lot on account of its effect on long term social inequalities.

The point the data raised supports a lot of the feedback people have said here, that many want to leave teaching but when it comes to the crunch far fewer are able to find anything in the private sector that is comparable in terms of pay and benefits, and where they do the conditions are often the same. I appreciate there was a particularly arrogant poster who suggested that a £55-60k salary in the private sector is peanuts and seemed to think that everyone earns the salary of a magic circle lawyer, but in reality it would be extremely difficult to transfer out of teaching into a salary of 55-60k unless you had a specific skill. Please note, as per the post, that the data related to classroom teachers which include unqualified, main and upper pay scales, full and part time. It does not include leadership roles, headteachers, or private schools. If they were included to reflect the average of the teaching population (as opposed to the classroom teacher subset) then the average would be considerably higher still.

[quote teacherwife]@noblegiraffe I think you're 100% right. You also see some of the reason in the rise in home tutoring. Lots of parents are 'filling in the gaps' with tutors. Not only are they not outraged that they have to do this (which I really don't understand), they are in some cases actually grateful that they're able to use this as a solution rather than 'having to' pay for private education. It's insane.[/quote]
Indeed. It's like how the Tories want to make us grateful we can access even more foodbanks if we need to...

Goal posts are continuously being moved at the last minute.

Rude, unkind parents who will not acknowledge their own vital role in the education of their children and just want to blame someone else when they aren’t top of the class or their behaviour is questioned.

Funding is not there and teachers and support staff are paying for basic supplies.

Support staff are working their backsides off for just a fraction above minimum wage and are essentially teaching the class. The level of responsibility placed on them is HUGE.

But we stay because the kids are generally amazing, you feel (sometimes) like you’re making a positive difference to someone’s future and it’s hard to walk away when you’ve invested so much time and so much of your heart into it…

School staff do not join the profession nor stay in their roles for the salary.

@Pumperthepumper

Echt, being a fallback option means we’re not recruiting teachers who go into it because they really want to do it. And teaching is different from those jobs because it means you’ve gone from primary school, high school, Uni and then back to a school. So your experience of being in any other environment is very limited.

Not sure what your point is here.

Are you saying teachers should have experience other than teaching?
and I don't agree with the "real world" argument.

I also don't agree that teaching, or any other job as a "fall back" results in less good teaching. There was thread earlier about people who'd left the private corporate world to teach - a fallback position.

Yes, I’m saying teaching should be seen as a further specialisation.

I’m continually amazed by people saying that working in a school isn’t working in “the real world”. What, does education exist in a parallel universe? You see every real world issue under the sun if you work in a school, some of which are very distressing to deal with.
As a late entrant to teaching, having experience of “the real world” made me no better than any other entrant, neither did it make me worse.

Indeed. It's like how the Tories want to make us grateful we can access even more foodbanks if we need to...

Did you notice Nadhim Zahawi's referring to the National Tutoring Scheme as 'now disadvantaged kids will be able to access tutoring just like the rich ones'....how about sorting education so that kids don't need tuition to make up for the fact they haven't had a proper maths teacher for years?

It's also a zero sum game as the exam pass rates are fixed. Tutoring increasing one individual's chances of passing their maths GCSE just means a lower chance for some other kid.

And then you end up in a tutoring arms race.

Which provides a nice little earner for teachers who are seeking to leave the profession or go part time.

SonicBroom

The problem I have with your numbers isn't how you have calculated them, but with your assumption that those leaving are either looking for a higher (you say equivalent) paid position, but many are leaving for lower paid jobs, or not going in to a job at all and are being a SAHP.

Apparently 1 in 10 teachers are in their first year of teaching and only 66% of them are still there 6 years later.

I dont know how that compares to other professions. I know vets are really struggling to keep people in practice but its much talked about in serious tones.

@MajorCarolDanvers

It's a good thing.

There are clearly lots of teachers who hate their jobs. That's not good for them or for children.

They should leave and do something else with their lives.

What's then needed is plenty of recruitment of new teachers.

Loads of teachers love their jobs and kids. Atm it’s just unrealistic expectations after covid. You’re expected to catch all the kids up after 2 years of interrupted education and have no support for any of the emotional / social sides. They’re finding it so much more difficult to be in a school setting / manage their own arguments etc than they ever have before. I work in a school with quite a number of young teachers and all of them are in tears most evening because they can’t deal with the constant pressure / expectations. It’s a big let’s brush covid under the carpet and pretend it didn’t happen but all the kids need to be exactly where they should be. There’s teachers who have been teaching for 10 years + who just can’t handle it anymore. Unless you’re working 13/14hour days and over weekends and holidays the workload is just impossible.. and then that’s on you. It’s a really difficult situation atm, I know that a lot of teachers like a moan and I’ve never really understood it myself before as a teacher.. but atm it’s bloody awful. So even if they do get a bunch of new teachers in. They’re all gonna hate it. You have no life. The young teachers at my school who are fresh outta uni and live with old uni mates etc always talk about how they literally have 0 time for themselves or a social life compared to their peers.. And pay seems good on paper but after your student loan, high pension, tax and NI it’s not that much. I take home about £150 more a month than a mate who’s on nearly 10k less than me. So it’s like you’re working stupidly long and hard tiring hours, for none of it to be good enough, and not a great pay cheque at the end. But it’s hard to just switch professions at the click of finger. With all the rising bills and costs etc people need a stable income. It’s just hard.

SonicBroom

And just food for thought, many teachers leave the profession in the first 5 years, lots in the first 3.

It sort of makes a mess of your numbers when a huge amount of the profession don't make it to the average that you have calculated.

@FrippEnos I haven’t made that assumption at all. I was just saying that it supports what other people have said about finding it difficult to get equivalent benefits elsewhere.

The numbers were in response to the notion that teaching is a low paid job, it’s not.

It's also irrelevant to bang on about how well-paid teaching is, how lovely the holidays are, how massive the pension is, if people coming into the profession are still quitting in large numbers (which they are) and if the government cannot entice people to train to be a teacher (which they can't).

If teaching is so great, why are we so short of them?

[quote SonicBroom]@FrippEnos I haven’t made that assumption at all. I was just saying that it supports what other people have said about finding it difficult to get equivalent benefits elsewhere.

The numbers were in response to the notion that teaching is a low paid job, it’s not.[/quote]
yet the equivalent benefits for someone new to the profession are much less than those that have been there years.

It is the issue with working with averages and not on a like for like or year by year basis.

If teaching is so great, why are we so short of them?

This.

Exactly. On paper it's a great job. And it can be. I genuinely enjoy the classroom teaching. Best job in the world.

But the pressure, expectations and workload are just insane. I've spent 2 days marking this holiday already. I haven't actually started my hols yet I suppose?!

If it's genuinely well paid, great benefits blah blah then why don't people want to do it? And why do those that do frequently run away very quickly?

The expertise and experience I have seen leave the classroom recently, it's a criminal waste of really good teachers. All of whom decided after 10+ years that it's unsustainable long term and quit for their own mental and physical health.

@FrippEnos and that’s different to other jobs how exactly? It’s not the problem with averages at all, it’s exactly why they are useful sometimes. They include new and experienced teachers and reflect the amount an average person can expect to get after an average tenure.

You’ll also find that because teaching has a relatively narrow pay scale compared to eg the generic corporate sector, that averages are more indicative than they would be elsewhere because there is less variation in the population characteristics. But clearly this doesn’t suit your narrative. If every teacher were to be given this amount when they joined they’d complain that there was no pay progression. You cannot determine whether an entire profession is high or low paid based on entry level salary. If you’d like I could probably adjust these to include private school and SLT salaries which would show even higher averages, but again we’d be moving away from the point that you seem insistent on trying to prove, despite the fact that the data says otherwise.

I reckon the average wage would be 55k if teachers we able to claim for all of the unpaid hours. Possibly more!

I’ve just had to pay £50 for a doctors letter about my autistic son. I have to pay because it’s ‘extra work’ for the doctor above and beyond their normal day. If teachers started charging for every extra like that everyone would be fucked!