Entering a new school year provides many challenges for all involved in education but none more than the teacher returning to the classroom. Districts across the U.S. not only witnessed over 300,000 public-school teachers and other staff leaving the field between February 2020 and May 2022, but many are now bracing themselves for a possible increased exodus in the upcoming year.

Teachers across the board are burned out from increased demands that represent a piling effect of continually adding one more thing on top of a list of responsibilities. With the academic need to close the pandemic-related learning gaps and the emotional well-being demands of a stressed-out student body, it's easy to see why teachers are overwhelmed and tapped out.

Listening to Teachers

The answers to coming to the aid of teachers are a complex mix of support mechanisms, new hires, and wage increases, yet at the root, according to many educators, is the need for proactive listening to those in the trenches. Emily Petersen is a former teacher with experience in public schools and charter schools in Maryland and Florida. She is now the Education Solutions Manager for Strategos Group and provides her reasons for deciding to leave the profession.

"Teacher burnout is a real issue and can be caused by a lack of a strong, supportive administrative team, student behaviors, parent overreach, and staff morale. The combination of these has contributed to my leaving and my low chance of returning to the classroom."

According to a recent NPR interview on the upcoming threat of a teacher exodus, Tiki Boyea-Logan, a 4th-grade teacher in Rowlett, Texas, hopes that legislators and school district leadership look more closely at the data on why teachers choose to leave. "I hope they really look at [data] and ask these teachers and pay attention to the answers of why they're leaving, [asking], 'What can we do to fix this?'" says Boyea-Logan. "If they don't, they're just gonna be hemorrhaging really good teachers for the foreseeable future."

School safety is an added element to teachers leaving the profession. The increase in school violence across the U.S. is a huge psychological weight on all educators. Teacher, Boyea-Logan acknowledges that her husband purchased a bulletproof backpack she brings to school. She finds it ridiculous that worry is even a part of an elementary environment, yet understands the reality facing teachers and students today.

Overall, a convergence of factors seems to be adding up for teachers, and for many, solutions are slow to arrive.

Teacher Shortage Solution

Many district and school leaders are primarily concerned with filling existing vacancies. To them, getting staffing under control is the first and foremost need. Tequilla Brownie, chief executive of TNTP, a nonprofit consulting service for districts, tells the New York Times that it's about filling seats and serving students. "Everybody right now is just talking about, frankly, warm bodies," she says. "The quality of teachers still matters. You never will get to quality if you don't get to quantity first."

While some districts in higher paying suburban communities report robust new hires, poorer, ethnically diverse, less paying districts are severely lagging. As a result, a recent Education Week survey across the U.S. indicates that nearly three-fourths of principals and district officials reported that the number of teaching applicants was insufficient to fill their open positions over the summer.

A balancing act is at play where districts are looking to increase empty teacher slots while also catering to the needs of the existing staff. New hires will hopefully take some of the load off existing educators in the long run, but in the near term, staff remains overburdened. As a result, the more experienced, highly qualified teacher considers early retirement, leading to cyclical attrition with fill-in shortages.

Alternative Solutions

Teacher resignations attract hiring managers in other sectors looking to fill talent in a tight labor market. Many classroom instructors are landing sales jobs, instructional coach positions, and behavioral health roles. With competition comes a need to change the narrative inside education to keep teachers from leaving and attract needed talent through alternative methods.

Strategos Partner and former Idaho State Superintendent of Public Instruction & President of Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), Tom Luna, has been well aware of the teacher shortage issue plaguing schools for years. He has championed alternative routes that could provide more high-quality teachers to the candidate pool. Luna is a proponent of the quality teacher over the quantity model and even sees changing the one-path certification process as a plus for attracting the younger generation to teach.

"The younger generation is avoiding teaching because they're not interested in the 30-year singular career path. They are looking for multiple career options as part of their long-term goals, and the single pathway to certification appears limiting. Multiple on-ramps and off-ramps are needed to expand the applicant pool.," says Luna. "Why not bring flexibility to the bottleneck and restrictions of the single certification path? Let's remove the stigma from alternative programs and recognize the value of qualified people entering the teaching profession from different life pursuits."

Wake-Up Call

Solutions abound, but time is ticking on the fates of teachers looking for more manageable teaching environments. It begins with school leadership and the community listening closely to educators who feel underpaid and overburdened.

Teachers have pulled the alarm bell, and unless all wake up to the realities at hand, strikes like the most recent occurrence in Seattle will only be the beginning.