The Suffolk Primary Teachers Association says stress is a large factor in staff leaving the industry
This follows a report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development showing many countries are facing teacher shortages
Last updated 10th Oct 2023
The Suffolk Primary Teachers Association says there needs to be a holistic approach in changing teaching to make it more appealing
This follows a report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development showing many countries are facing teacher shortages
Rebecca Leek from The Suffolk Primary Teachers Association told some of the things she thinks are contributing to Teachers Leaving the profession.
"We're not driven by salaries. We're not, we don't do the job for a high salary.
"However, it has to be healthy enough and it has to show us that we're valued enough in line with other graduates. And I think that's where the issue lies particularly...
"Tt (their salary) has to be valued in the same way or in a similar way to other graduate professions like entry level legal professions, for example.
"And at the moment it it isn't equal to that."
Rebecca also mentioned that teachers work on average around 50 hours a week.
"There is such a multitude of things that we do as teachers. We're increasingly trained and things like mental health. And so we're handling that as well.
"Just trying to learn new things about cognitive science and integrate that into our teaching.
"There's a lot of professional development that's going on all the time and it's a very high-level job."
How it's impacting children's education?
Rebecca explained due to the shortages in teaching, many schools are seeing gaps in 'specialist teachers'.
Therefor teachers are having to fill in for classes they are not experts in such as maths and physics.
Rebecca said her daughters had experienced this first hand.
What will make Teachers stay?
Rebecca explained to us that teachers typically are allowed to use 10% of their day for planning and preparation.
In this time they have to make sure that they're "adapting their teaching for a diverse group of children" as well as marking, lesson plans and assessments.
She explained that realistically this isn't enough time and in some other countries teachers are allocated double the amount of time (20%).
She told us if they were allowed to have 20% instead of 10% of their time to complete admin it would reduce their stress and job satisfaction would increase because the teachers wouldn't be carrying that stress into lessons.
"Speaking to colleagues and knowing what's worked in terms of trusts recruiting teachers...when increased PPA is offered so to say 20% instead of 10%, then the salary is almost irrelevant because then the actual stress load of the job is reduced and that's attractive."
Rebecca also wants the way schools to be run differently, shifting the focus away from 'efficiency.'
"At the moment and over the last few years there seems to be a drive to get schools to run highly efficiently.
"In some respects, I understand that we don't want to waste money. But at the same time, if we're always looking to slice off budgets and funding into schools, things become tighter and tighter.
"There isn't enough capacity in leadership. There isn't enough."