Teachers leaving the profession continues to be a serious problem in education.
Even though the demand for teachers is higher than ever, there are teachers leaving the profession in staggering numbers. School boards and educational research organizations are trying to discover why this is happening.
As a past teacher, I can give some first hand reasons why teachers consider leaving the profession.
Let me clarify, I loved teaching and the impact the profession has on the next generation; for me, the decision was more a change of lifestyle than a displeasure in my career. I can, however, give some practical concerns arising among teachers that lead to many of them choosing a different career.
#1 – LOW SALARY
I think the main reason teachers are leaving the profession is the lack of competitive salary. Many people believe that teachers have “the easy life” because they get summers off, but teachers work significantly more hours than we get paid for, especially when we have a dual assignment such as sponsoring a club or coaching a sport. If you took the average yearly salary and divided it by the number of hours that most teachers actually work; the result was that teachers make about $10.00 an hour with all the late nights on buses coming back from games, and early morning tutoring sessions for struggling students, not to mention the three page essays for one hundred and fifty students. If you are considering going into teaching for the money, then you may want to reconsider your career choice.
#2 – STUDENT BEHAVIOR
The second reason why I believe teachers are leaving the profession has to do with the lack of morals and discipline that some students receive at home, and the inability to do much about it in the classroom. This generation is the most fatherless, divorced, and neglected generations in the history of America, and it is noticed in the classroom. For young teachers, it is often difficult to balance teaching with discipline when respect and honor for teachers has not been instilled in students. Some students are not taught moral values at home, and children are often in situations where they raise themselves. In this case, it becomes difficult to expect a teenager to follow your rules and turn in homework when the student has never had to follow rules or have responsibility at home.
#3 – LACK OF SUPPORT
On the other side of that argument, and another main reason for teachers leaving the profession, is the issue of parents. The problem with some parents is that they often see their child through rose colored glasses. Their child could curse at you and throw a desk across the room, and somehow the parent will find a way to blame the teacher. It is very difficult for teachers, especially young ones, to help parents understand that their child must take responsibility for their actions. Parents look to school administrators to discipline teachers for their child’s failure, all the while having no expectations for their child to change. This is a very difficult and tricky situation to navigate, and if a teacher does not have the support of administration, the teacher will find themselves in meeting after meeting getting reprimanded with very little positive outcomes.
#4 – TOO MUCH TESTING
The last reason teachers leave the profession is probably the most frustrating, and that has to do with standardized testing. Many districts are being pressured to perform better “or else” and I agree that performance standards need to be raised, but the responsibility must fall equally on students and parents as it does on teachers and administrators. If other professions were treated like teachers, then every time a person committed a crime in their jurisdiction, a police officer should be fired, or every time a patient got sicker, a doctor should lose his license. The fear of losing a career because a fifteen year old does not take a test seriously is a sad reality of standardized testing.
What’s the Difference Between Burnout and Demoralization, and What Can Teachers Do About It?
Teaching: Respect but dwindling appeal
Seven reasons people no longer want to be teachers
12 Smart Ways to Fight Teacher Burnout That Really Work
Why Teachers Quit
Why it’s a big problem that so many teachers quit — and what to do about it
What Are The Main Reasons Teachers Call It Quits?
Video: Why Do Teachers Quit More Than Other Professionals?
Why Good Teachers Quit
Why Do Teachers Quit?
A FEW BOOKS ON THE TOPIC
Teachers in Crisis: Why Do They Leave After an Average of Five Years in the Classroom?
Why Do Teachers Leave the Teaching Profession?: Can Alternative Certificate Programs eliminate the U.S Teacher Shortage Issue?
Examples of Great Teachers
In West Oakland School That Keeps Losing Teachers, She’s Stayed Almost Five Decades!
How Do You Make a Great Teacher?
Someone didn’t do their research if they went into teaching for the money. Wrong profession for that but, many are looking for what they think is an easy job and Summer’s off. I pity the fool. YOU must have a love for children and teaching must be your profession not a job. Teachers have never been paid their worth nor respected for what they do. Teachers don’t have three months off or hours that end at 3:00pm. Most don’t stick together and say to admin what needs to be said. Most are afraid of their job. They will complain to each other but not to the powers that be. Many want their students to like them. They need YOU to teach them and demand excellence and respect. I never cared whether students liked me. They were going to do the work and make liers out of all those who said they couldn’t. Many teachers need help and will not ask. Much Love
Could’ not agree with you more.
Central administration thinking they know more than the teachers ,
Asking input from the teacher and not using that input.
Lack of parent support and thinking their child is perfect.
Kids & parents entitlement issues.
Too much testing
Lack of respect for the profession
Low salaries
Overworked underpaid
The low salary I knew about when I signed up to be a teacher. Student behavior I could deal with because I looked for the real causes and did my best to help them. I did not sign up to be a giver of meaningless tests that destroy students confidence in their ability to succeed in school. The lack of support was very troubling. I did my research and I knew what kids needed to be successful I didn’t need someone who was not in my room with my kids telling me what I was doing wrong. I could know longer allow someone to treat me with so much disrespect when I was a great teacher who knew and loved her students. That is why I retired. I could no longer treat children the way that I was expected too. Wrong is wrong but until teachers are once again able to teach and make the decisions without interference from those who do not know, more good teachers will continue to leave the profession and the kids will be the ultimate losers.
There are a few points that I rarely read about or hear in any discussions regarding teachers leaving the profession. I’ll use the restaurant business for my analogy. Those bussing tables receive the lowest wages similar to a school’s janitorial staff. The next level in the restaurant business is the wait staff, those who serve the customers. In schools, these are the teachers, who can make a living; however, the salary is situated to its position on the totem pole. Like the restaurant business, especially corporate restaurants, the higher incomes are in management. Schools function on a similar business model, yet teachers often deny this reality.
Another aspect is the history involved. Many of the earliest educators were members of religious orders and took a vow of poverty. Teacher salaries were set to be slightly above the poverty level. Admittedly, I’d like to know more about this viewpoint (and I stress this is my opinion and not a research fact).
I’m just not sure how often these points factor into the conversations about teachers. Wait staff, like teacher staffing, has large turnover rates. A college degree nor an advanced one can change the position of teachers on the flow chart.
Feeling totally unappreciated
Jumping on every new approach to come around and never letting go of the ones that are not working
Reasons I retired
As one in the trenches for 20 years, I see the following reasons for teachers leaving:
• Increase in class sizes that makes it difficult to meet the needs of the students and increases behavior issues.
• Disrespect from administrators.
• The apparent movement to push out veteran teachers. (to replace them with younger, more malleable, less expensive teachers?)
• The addition of more and more duties and responsibilities (e.g. paperwork) without removing anything else from our plates.
• The DYOD movement which allows cell phones, tablets, etc in the classroom without giving us any control over content, nor allowing us to take up devices being used inappropriately.
• The increasing teacher responsibility for any and all problems in the schools while students and parents bear little or no responsibility. For example, if the student doesn’t do homework or misses class for the entire semester (I have one of those), the responsibility is on the teacher to explain why.
Yes, testing is a frustration. It’s also the loss of control over content and pacing. And the mountains of paperwork to show that you’ve addressed the objectives and remediated and met IEPs, etc.
The pay is not as significant a reason as most expect. We didn’t get into this to get rich. However, when a young teacher realizes that he/she can’t support a family on a teacher’s salary, there is often no option but to leave. Those of us who are fortunate enough to have a spouse whose income can allow us to remain in the classroom will stay until one of these other factors pushes us out (or we, happily, reach retirement).
I worry for the future of education in this nation. There has always been problems of one sort or another, but the pressure on teachers is building exponentially these days. I wonder when the breaking point will come when too many will walk away to keep the system afloat.
These are the exact four reasons I quit ten years ago.
Some reasons left out!
1. lack of respect
2. constant vilifying and teacher-blaming (yes, that’s a real term amongst educators) due to the now-accepted, 45 year old corporate reform mythology of a failing US school system, and also due to the US DOE which is now led in policy by billionaires and corporate/Wall Street big money
3. lack of teacher unions actually standing up for teachers at the NATIONAL level (NEA, AFT)
4.lack of teacher voices being solicited and heard in policy decisions
5. ever-growing and VERY time-consuming mountain of daily paperwork and data management
6. Republican legislatures
6. campaigns by ALEC and others to end teacher benefits, freeze salaries, cut pensions, and end unions
7. The O’Bama administration’s clear agenda to dismantle public ed in the US, this from even a Democratic administration
8. charter schools for profit and charters that suck away public school tax dollars while sending back the hardest and/or expensive to educate students
9. Value-added (student test score) comprising up to 50% of teacher job performance evaluation of teachers, when there is NO proven correlation, in fact research shows 14% of student test scores max is attributable to the teacher
10. loss of autonomy
11. scripted lessons (A robot could do them.)
12. the push from big business to add tech to EVERYTHING, too soon and without training.
13. for many teachers, Common Core, SBACC, PARCC
14. working evenings and weekends and vacations and summers
15. constant, daily meetings eating up lunch time, planning time, time before and after school
16. federal, state, district, building mandates and increasing workload
17. constant admin walk-throughs with their i-pads clicking off check-boxes
18. competition pitting one teacher against another, instead of the collaborative culture and climate that education and educators need to thrive
19. unreimbursed expenses that increase now each year as schools are more and more underfunded
20. misguided federal ed policy
21. demeaning of veteran teachers because they cost more
22. right to work states
23. the expected SCOTUS decision aimed at breaking unions
24. Loss of “tenure”, which at K-12 only really means a right to “due process’, NOT a job for life
25. US DOE
26. micromanagement by administrators who couldn’t teach their way out of a paper bag to save their lives
27. no recognition being given to the actual problem, which is POVERTY and underfunding
28. more and more duties piled on each year
29. the buck stops with teachers, never administrators, policy, parents, or families.
30. The NCLB re-write to ESSA
31. the OVER-RELIANCE on data from poorly-designed tests, as opposed to teacher-made tests and teacher judgement
32. lack of support for the new entity, kindergarteners and 1st graders who enter as children of trauma and cannot really learn
33. lack of time to plan best lessons, especially with other teachers
34. the every-few years new initiatives for the district based on new-hires in central office who have their own pet programs, OR based on the latest “research-based” fad that must be adopted
35. class sizes that increase every year or two
36. administrators with NO teaching experience
Too much testing should be #1, and no respect in popular media and from policy-makers in government should be #2.
This is very true more because if principals being promoted that cant or wont support teachers
Disipline not supported and told cant fail a student especially minorities. Inability to communicate with skyrocketing spainish illegals attending without paying taxes
So PERFECTLY stated!
Teachers across our country are applauding and saluting you, Dr. Fioriello!!!
This article is very concise and very accurate. When I teach ESL students from cultures which revere teachers , the atmosphere in the classroom is entirely different. Much less rude behavior , so work can be done. Also, teachers leave higher education for the lack of full time positions , poor wages , poor benefits.
I believe the order is very different! I just retired and my order is #4, then not being able to teach each year’s group what THEY need to move on, then too much paperwork, then #2, #3,, and finally #1. I would have continued teaching if I was actually allowed to TEACH my students.
I was a HS teacher for six years. I left because of #3. The lack of leadership in my school was so apparent and yet the school board and Superintendent refused to do anything.
You left out administration that does not support its teachers. They would rather shutdown the parents complaints by confirming the child/parent version of any issue. This bshort sited view will cripple the student later on Insread of buckling down and doing the work. The inmates are in charge of the asylum!
This is so true. The education system is failing both teachers and students. We are graduating seniors who can not read, write, or even think at the senior level. Many of these students are so far behind that they always will struggle in society in terms of income and occupational advancement.
Thank you. I have long wanted to teach High School algebra. Sounds like my job at the after school math learning center is better and probably more help to the students who are here.
I agree that teachers performance should not rest on standardized test scores. Some children do poorly on test due to test anxiety & some just don’t try very hard . I do,however, believe that every professional should have performance evaluation annually. If the employee doesn’t meet the job requirements, displinary action should ensue. After given time if employee still isn’t complying with job standards specified they should be terminated .
Another reason is the asinine amount of documentation one must keep. You must document the documentation to document what you documented to document the original documentation. Once submitted, no one ever, anywhere reads it. But, it is documentated.
To me, there is a direct correlation between the amount of intrusion by government and student test scores. Classrooms belong to teachers and students NOT bureaucrats.
Exactly! I left the profession right before Thanksgiving because of these reasons. For me though, I would change student behavior to lack of famiky time.
Another source: “The Dumbing Down of America’s Students”.
And I would put student behavior ahead of low pay on the list.
Pingback: Teachers Leaving Profession – Working Woes
I think you are dead on with your 4 reasons. Teaching is not the ‘easy’ profession that people may believe. I would rearrange the four reasons though, making student behavior number one. Students as a group no loner understand respect, therefor they don’t know how to show respect. Where you describe ‘some’ students as not following rules or having responsibilities at home, I would describe it as ‘most’.
I love teaching but the disrespect is overshadowing all the love. I struggle on a daily basis.
I do not think salary is the #1 reason. I think testing/standardized curriculum and a close second is paperwork/data and the lack of teachers to use their own creativity and initiative to make their classrooms their own is the #1& #2 reasons. Then student behavior and the lack of support with that. Which is also caused by the standardized curriculum which is boring to teachers and students alike. If all these things were taken away then teachers would be fine with their salaries.
All of these things have been caused by the so-called accountability movement which is the thinly veiled attack on public schools by the politicians who are funded by the corporations and super pacs that want to make schools into money making businesses instead of the public supported services that they have historically been.
Teacher education programs need to do a much better job of ensuring that human behavior, child development theory, and opportunities for practice of classroom management strategies are just as important as academic content knowledge. My experience is that new teachers are very skilled in the content area, but have no knowledge of empirical best practices for ensuring appropriate classroom behavior. Sad truth is that our students do come to us lacking skills. We can point fingers at families until the cows come home but that’s not going to help the student comply. Explicit teaching of expected behavior should be just as important as explicit content instruction.
Lack of administrative support is bigger than parental. If you have high standards but your administration bends to the will of a parent. I’ve been asked to change grades and policies bc a parent complained. Oh and my “high” standards do not include penalties for late work or the failure rate would double.
I do agree with a;; 4 reasons . I taught for 30 years .
I quit because there was too much politics by the administration. Common Core is terrible. Micro managing and no fun.
My first thought was : Incompetent principal. I guess that would fit in at #3.
-Retired after 30 years.
Read what Kathy Margolis, a former teacher from Brisbane, Australia has to say about this issue – https://www.facebook.com/kathy.margolis.7/posts/10208843143294643
It seems I am not alone. Disrespected by students,parents and administrators. If teaching was so easy, administrators would still be teaching. They left because they couldn’t stand the kids.
All good points! Thanks for sharing.
What is the date of publication for this article?
Pingback: 4 Real Reasons Why Teachers Leave the Profession - Serena Herodias