In 2019, Sheena Graham received the Connecticut Teacher of the Year Award.
Two years later, in January 2021, she retired five years earlier than she expected to.
Her reason? A “total lack of respect” for educators, made clear by the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Like Sheena, K-12th teachers have been leaving their jobs in droves due to burn-out. While the COVID-19 pandemic brought this topic to the forefront, stress has always been the leading reason for teachers quitting [1].
K-12th public school teachers in the United States have, and always have had, hard jobs. And there’s lots of reasons why.
Teachers put in a lot just to make themselves qualified for their jobs.
Teachers need to meet many requirements before meeting qualifications.
The requirements for becoming a teacher vary by state, but most K-12th public school teachers in the United States usually need to go through the following steps. Best case scenario, the whole process takes at least 4-5 years when one studies education in one's undergraduate school. [2]
However, the average salary that teachers make is not that much.
The average annual salary for K-12 teachers is $64,336 among all states. Compared to the mean for all occupations in each state, in most of the states, K-12 teacher's mean salary is close to the mean for all (in the range of -10% and 10%), with some states a bit lower or higher. [3]
This amount is especially stark in contrast to other professions’ salaries.
It's unbalanced especially considered the amount of time, money, and energy they need to put in first to become a teacher. It may take around 10 years for a teacher to pay off the student loans [4]. Below is an interactive plot for you to explore the comparison between the mean annual salaries for different occupations. Scroll on the graph to zoom in, and drag the graph to move.
The truth is that K-12th teachers are overworked.
While it's hard to convert teachers' work into money and determine how much they should earn compared to the overall mean. We can see a totally different story from hourly wage. K-12 teacher's average hourly wage is $23, which is far less than the average hourly wage. Below is an interactive plot for you to explore the comparison between the mean annual salaries for different occupations. Scroll on the graph to zoom in, and drag the graph to move.
For all the work that teachers put into their qualifications, the return on investment is not that much.
Those who make it into K-12th public teaching positions have their work cut out for them once they arrive in the classroom.
Compared to teachers in other developed countries, US teachers generally work more than their counterparts do.
US public school teachers rank second in the list of top ten countries whose teachers work the most hours. They are surpassed only by teachers from Mexico [5].
Even compared to typical jobs within the United States, teachers are overworking.
Based on survey data from K-12th public school teachers in 2015 to 2016, public school teachers work, on average, over 53 hours per week. This is true for public K-12th teachers across populations, including school type, community type, etc. Use the dropdown to explore how different breakdowns of teacher still reveal this trend.
This is far greater than how much teachers are required to work by contract.
In fact, on average, K-12th US public school teachers are working over 15 hours more than their contracted hours [6].
This is because the majority of a teacher’s contracted hours are spent delivering instruction to students. Little contracted time is allocated for instructional preparation, so teachers must prepare their curriculum, materials, etc. outside of normal contracted hours.
This problem may be especially acute amongst younger, newer teachers who have to make their own materials. According to our own qualitative research results, new teachers generally spend more time on classroom preparation than their experienced counterparts because they do not have access to pre-existing content [7].
Additionally, as teachers take on more students, they must devote more time and energy to their work.
Class size has a large impact on classroom management. When there are fewer students to distract one other, teachers can also spend more time working with with students one on one. One teacher we interviewed, for example, mentioned feeling “lucky” to have a smaller class size of 28 because larger classes are typically “a disaster” [7].
However, at a ratio of 30.4 students to one teacher, the United States in 2019 had the 8th highest student-to-teacher ratio compared to other developed nations. The effects of the COVID-19 pandemic may have increased this ratio, for as teachers leave their jobs due to stress, those who remain must take on additional students [5].
Altogether, this means more on-the-job stress and more uncontracted hours, all for the same amount of pay, which contributes to both more stress on the teacher’s part and lower quality one-on-one education for the students.
Teachers’ jobs are difficult the moment they walk through their classroom door. The COVID-19 pandemic continues to exacerbate these difficulties.
Altogether, these factors create a stressful working environment for K-12th teachers.
Over half of teachers considering retiring earlier than planned, and many of the teachers that remain say they are experiencing burnout.[8]
The number of educators in the United States is declining.
The number of educators in public education declined from to 10.0 million in January 2022 from 10.6 million in January 2020, a net loss of around 600,000 educators, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS).
Teachers are leaving for other jobs because they are overworked and frustrated.
Among all the aspects that ex-teachers rate between their previous teaching jobs and their current jobs, “ability to balance personal life and work”, “influence over workplace policies and practices”, and “autonomy or control over own work” are the top 3 things they rated highest for their current non-teaching jobs, which shows teachers are overwork and frustrated in some levels [9].
The destination occupations of teachers who left education include “Lawyers, Judges, magistrates, and other judicial workers”, “Physicians and surgeons”, “Postsecondary teachers”, “Retail salespersons”, “Secretaries and administrative assistants”, etc. [10]
This exodus of teachers leaving their positions only exacerbates the situation for those who remain.
In conclusion, K-12th public school teachers have, and always have had, hard jobs, for a vast number of reasons related to financial impact, job stresses, and more. These create feelings of burnout for teachers and, eventually, make them leave their jobs.
We need to do more to improve the working conditions for K-12th teachers.
How can you help?
Contact your local representative
Urge them to support the Public Service Freedom to Negotiate Act.
Donate to your school district
Many school districts, like the Oakland Unified School District, accept donations online
Tell your teachers about MateriALL
MateriALL is a free tool that helps automate the lesson-planning process for teachers.
