Writer: Asia Ashley
Published July 18, 2022
Bluefield Daily Telegraph
Top education officials in Georgia are looking reduce the number of teachers leaving the workforce due to teacher burnout, which educators say has increased during the pandemic.
Approximately 31% of educators say they are unlikely or highly unlikely to remain in education for another five years, according to a 2022 PAGE Legislative Survey conducted by the Professional Association of Georgia Educators, comprised of more than 4,500 members.
“I have seen it personally as a classroom teacher and in my role as Georgia Teacher of the Year: Every year, Georgia is losing talented teachers to burnout,” stated Cherie Bonder Goldman, 2022 Georgia Teacher of the Year. “This is to the detriment of Georgia’s students, whose success depends on having excellent, experienced teachers in the classroom.”
At the request of Georgia Department of Education, University of Georgia’s Carl Vinson Institute facilitated a “Task Force on Teacher Burnout” this year comprised of teachers across Georgia to address factors contributing to teacher burnout and solutions.
The report indicates that while testing requirements have been reduced at the state level, the number of district-level tests has increased.
“There were so many tests from every angle, district and state required, that the students were numb. And it doesn’t just impact them. These scores fall on us. They reflect on us,” a middle school science teacher said.
The report states that local districts should eliminate redundant testing requirements, create a process for teacher input in the creation of new assessments, and re-evaluate the disproportionate weight of various tests.
Another area of burnout teachers conveyed is lack of time for planning and instruction, mostly due to meetings, trainings or added duties.
Local districts should compensate teachers who cover other classes or are assigned other duties during their planning time, the report suggests. Among the calls to action, the reports also states that districts should reform and streamline paperwork and data collection processes, and ensure adequate time for training and rollout of new initiatives, while protecting time for teachers to meet their existing obligations.
“The workload is nearly impossible to tackle during the hours we are actually at the school. So many of us have to ‘volunteer’ our time simply to do what is required of us,” an elementary gifted resource teacher with 8 to 15 years experience said in the report.
Much of the burnout is associated with pandemic-related pressures, with teachers citing unrealistic expectations to “return to normal” after the pandemic “without giving teachers the time, support, resources and compassion to meet students at their current academic level.”
“The emphasis needs to shift from expecting high standardized test scores to celebrating student growth. The unspoken message that if a student isn’t successful then it’s the teacher’s fault needs to go away — there are so many factors outside of a teacher’s control that impact student achievement,” an elementary school language arts teacher said.
