In a full employment economy, there are many options for purpose-driven, socially astute, and smart people. Unfortunately, many jobseekers with the skills needed to be excellent teachers are avoiding the field or, having entered it, packing up their materials and resources—never to return to the classroom.
Much has been written about the national teacher shortage. Of the 8 percent of teachers who leave the classroom voluntarily each year, two-thirds were just getting started, departing in the first three to five years of their tenure. According to TNTP, some of those exiting the field were among the best and brightest. And many were working with our nation’s communities in the greatest need of effective teachers. Recommendations to increase the number of teachers and address quality hit at core policy issues: teacher pay (see Tennessee and Texas), teacher preparation (see Mississippi), diversity among the teacher workforce (suggestions from Ed Trust and NCTQ), and retirement benefits, to name a few.
Policy recommendations suggest that the solutions to teacher attrition lie somewhere far away from the decisions made at a school in future legislative sessions or union negotiations. And though we hope to see continued policy work to improve teachers’ working conditions at scale and, in the process, increase student achievement, school leaders cannot wait for the future. Every year that a student lacks an effective teacher, there are negative ripple effects on their quality of life, including decreased civic engagement, economic challenges, and threats to mental and physical well-being.
Our work in schools across the country has reaffirmed that teachers make decisions based upon their own experiences in the classroom and with their school communities. We know that teachers want to make a difference, and they will not stay where they find their work untenable. Fortunately, many school leaders are developing school cultures that promote teacher effectiveness by focusing on variables that are under their immediate control. Doing this well improves teacher recruitment, induction, and retention.
What follows are two case studies that illustrate rural examples of “how not to” and “how to” improve teacher efficacy and overall working conditions. Both schools serve similar demographics in different parts of the country, struggle to recruit and retain effective teachers, and are categorized as underperforming. In short, they’re exactly the sort of institutions most in need of a timely solution to teacher attrition.
School 1
Leading a student population of roughly one hundred students in grades K–12 with fourteen teachers, the principal tried to leverage collaborative teams as a way of supporting new educators and drawing on the expertise of the group. Unfortunately, key components of effective implementation were neglected. The designated meeting time for collaboration was rarely honored, for example. When meetings did occur, expectations were inconsistent for teachers. And teams did not receive consistent job-embedded learning and actionable feedback
Teachers became progressively disenfranchised, and many thought that instruction was not an administrative priority. At the end of the 2017–18 school year, two teachers resigned, and another six did the following year—a 57 percent attrition rate in just twenty-four months. None of the teachers left because of retirement, and some were within their first two years of teaching. When asked about their decision to leave, salary was not the first response. In fact, one teacher explained that she was taking a pay cut to switch schools. Most staff cited a lack of professional satisfaction exacerbated by ineffective leadership. And unfortunately, student learning continues to suffer with a three-point decrease in composite ACT scores in just two years.
School 2
With seventeen teachers and 260 students between grades seven and twelve, the principal sought outside eyes and ears to help her plan for rapid improvement when the school was identified as underperforming. Starting with focus groups, interviews, observations, and surveys, we identified ways that the principal could invest in relationships with the teachers. Her implementation plan included:
- A commitment across the faculty to collaborative teacher teams
- Development of teacher leadership to shepherd the work of each content and/or grade-level team
- Ongoing, job-embedded professional learning on how to leverage data to plan dynamic instruction and intervention
- Increased use of actionable feedback through Transparent Teacher Practices (e.g., learning walkthroughs, lesson study, and collaborative coaching).
Growth became the clarion call, as teachers and administrators practiced strategies together and built relationships of trust that were tethered to a shared commitment to students. At the end of 2017–18 school year, two teachers resigned, with one retiring and the other relocating due to a change in their spouse’s employment; the next year, none left. The staff maintain a high level of satisfaction because they are experiencing greater collective efficacy. The school exited turnaround status after three years.
Keeping teachers engaged
Teaching is a collective effort, and the most powerful predictor of a student’s performance in a subject in any given year is what they learned in the previous grade. What any one teacher or school can achieve with students is critically dependent on the teaching quality of their colleagues. Given this interdependent nature, shortages of qualified candidates negatively impact the efficacy of career educators, too. Leaders who appreciate the local contributions of teachers have the ability to minimize teacher attrition rates by systematically addressing variables that are under their control. When principals establish a desire to develop meaningful collaboration, seek and incorporate feedback from teachers about the working conditions within the school, and employ smart implementation tactics, improvement is possible.
