Third of England’s teachers who qualified in last decade ‘have left profession’: DfE data

[sunnydaytoday0]

www.theguardian.com/education/2023/jan/09/third-of-englands-teachers-who-qualified-in-last-decade-have-left-profession

Nearly a third of teachers who qualified in the last decade have since left the profession, according to Labour analysis that has been released as the party attempts to shift the political focus on to education.

With the results of strike ballots by teaching unions due in the coming days, Labour intends to use a Commons vote this week to push their plan to impose VAT on private school fees, which they say would help pay for new teachers in the state sector.

According to a Labour analysis of Department for Education statistics, of just under 270,000 teachers who qualified in England between 2011 and 2020, more than 81,000 have since left the profession, or three in 10 of the total.

Why didn't Sunak make sorting out the absolute crisis in staffing in education one of his New Year promises?

Because he doesn't give a shit

Because he doesn't especially care about state education. I am not sure why folk are perpetually surprised by Tories behaving like Tories.

Tories gonna Tory. It shouldn’t be a surprise after nearly thirteen years.

Ha, cross-post.

Because he doesn’t care and they will fill the void with cover supervisors and a sushi conveyor belt of NQTs?

I’m one of the teachers in the statistic. I’m never going to be a class teacher again. All of the lovely gummy smiles and a-ha moments do NOT cancel out the culture of fear, bureaucracy and ungrateful parents.

Labour are really disappointing me on this (obviously the Tories are far worse!). There is no point paying for new teachers if you can't retain them. There are so many brilliant, experienced teachers who are leaving the profession and taking all their skills and knowledge with them - we need to find a way to keep hold of them, not flail around for desperate ideas to get more trainees and NQTs. They need to solve the issues which mean that teachers don't want to stay. The VAT plan will drive more pupils into an overloaded state system; I cannot see that it will help this crisis at all. Please can we have a political party who actually have a strategy to tackle this rather than a politics of envy empty gesture?

There's been Tory governments before during my lifetime without such a large exodus. It's more than just that surely. I'd imagine increased burdens and pressures on teachers are having impact too. It's lazy just to blame the Tories they're one of a number of reasons.

I'm not doubting that education is in a terrible position, but I wonder what 'left the profession' actually means / how it is measured.

Is it people who have left teaching to go and work in other professions? Does the figure include those who have left to be SAHPs for a period?

I thought about training as a teacher but all I heard were horror stories. I’m not surprised people are leaving.

But yeah, the Tories are shit and don’t care about anything but their rich mates- people should know that by now.

Oh and in response to the question in the OP - this government know they aren't going to see power again for a long time. So they're doing their best to destroy the NHS and state education for the benefit of their cronies who will profit from the ruination of the state. It's a deliberate decision to drive it all into the ground so that the vultures can swoop in and feast off the carcass. We are watching the death throes of a greedy, incompetent, amoral bunch of idiots who are looking for the best way to line their pockets once they're out of politics for good in 2024. It will take a long time to pick up the pieces.

Indeed! There was an article in the Times the other day, about the current education secretary, which described her as "strike-loathing" - which I commented was something of a tautology and I'd like to see the list of Tory MPs who are NOT "strike-loathing".

Teachers' pay since the Tories took power again - I think we can all remember the long period of "austerity", when public sector workers were "all in this together" and subjected to a pay freeze - has decilined massively. Their conditions of service are awful - I can't see why anyone stands it for more than a few years.

I started teaching in 1981. It was a different world.

Another aspect of not addressing the retention problem and just focussing on trying to get more new people into the job is that the pool of experienced teachers drops. I think this is having a big problem with a lot of schools trying to fill head of department positions or middle management posts. I know of some schools where appointing a new head of maths is extremely difficult. I guess one way around this is just appointing NQTs or NQTs+1 year into management posts..

I'm a current trainee and already at this point. I'm going to finish this year because I refuse to be a failure, but I am not looking for a teaching job in September. Abso-fucking-lutely no chance with the state education is in. I'll just wait.

The pay really is a huge part of my decision too. By the time I've paid into pension and student loan I'll take home around £1800 a month, and have absolutely no free time for at least 2 years as an ECT. It will cost me £300 per month at least for wraparound care and then more in other out-sourcing costs (dog walker, cleaner, gardener) etc because I don't have time to do those things myself. I'll likely be in what is effectively an abusive relationship with management and have to tolerate abuse from parents too,

Financially I may as well be a TA/cover supervisor/HLTA/Go on supply. It'll even out. Where's the incentive to actually do the job?

Yes, the wider context is very complex but the question in the OP was ‘why isn’t Sunak prioritisi g this crisis?’, and pp and I have answered accordingly.

I'm a teacher and from my perspective I think workload and behaviour of pupils are the two biggest culprits for people leaving the profession.

Workload can be dealt with funding. Use the money to employ more teachers, so timetables are lighter, class sizes are smaller and upskill them with CPD, give them better resources etc etc. Use funding for SEN students rather than sticking them in a class of 32 and expecting one teacher to provide an equitable education for every single student every lesson.

Behaviour of pupils is mostly down to parents I reckon, but also effective leadership and management. I've worked in schools where the SLT are absolutely shocking, it was no wonder the kids were running riot.

Agree with this 100%. I've seen it first hand.

It isn’t a priority for parents either, in my experience - can’t understand why, but you’ll get loads of comments saying “my DCs school isn’t like this” and “they should try living in the real world” and “good, that makes room for people who WANT to do the job” etc etc etc.

Having been a teacher once I would certainly not like to these days. Most teachers I know who have left the profession have not left because of the money but because of the problems they have with discipline and stress caused by the emphasis that everything is the teacher’s fault. A young teacher I know he’s just left the profession and was no doubt brilliant with kids one-to-one but is just worn out by the constant struggle with disruption and disorder with absolutely no back-up from higher up. Of course labour want to make everything political but it was their policies sown in their years in office which have led to the break-down. The best of it is a lot of the kids go to private education

I know there is a huge crisis, but 7 in 10 people still in the job a decade later doesnt sound as bad as I thought. I dont know what other profes3sions retention rates are like.

Every single teacher I know who I graduated in the same year with has since quit the profession.

I'm really surprised it isn't more than that.
I thought 1/2 of NQTs never reached 5 years?

Be interesting to know how many teachers are still there after 50.

The statistic doesn't say 70% of people are still in the job a decade later..

It says that 70% of those who have qualified in that decade are still in the job.

The % who qualified 10 years ago who are still teaching will be much lower than 70% given the figures for the most recent year is quite a bit higher than 70%.

Aah! I thought it sounded better than i expected.

Sunak can only commit to 4 promises not being met. 5 would be overstretching.