Why Teachers Quit and What Administrators Would Do if They Wanted to Keep Them

BY NANCY BAILEY May 13, 2014

A parent I know who is a strong crusader for goodness and public schooling told me about a Forbes article, “The Top 8 Reasons Your Best People Are About to Quit – And How You Can Keep Them.”

How does this list apply to teachers?

How do the negative business reasons described by Forbes affect teachers and drive them to quit? How could principals or district administrators keep teachers, if they wanted to, and what are the real reasons teachers quit? Here’s the Forbes list adapted to teaching.

1.    Overloading

Teachers have larger and larger class sizes with extremely diverse students, all with individual needs. This includes students with disabilities and ELL students. Usually teachers have approx. 60 min. a day for planning. Sixty minutes can be eaten up fast with parent meetings or a variety of other scheduled events that have little to do with real planning. Then there’s paperwork. Teachers are laden with assessment preparation and tracking results and that all takes time away from the real teaching preparation that matters. There is also nothing that kills the joy of teaching more than being overloaded with chores that you don’t believe in or find purposeful.

2.    Micro-managing

When a principal micromanages and treats teachers with little professionalism, it will eventually drive them to look elsewhere or quit if they can. Currently, Common Core State Standards are micromanaged standards everyone must follow. Teachers are usually proud of their creativity and ideas, but CCSS gives them little breathing room. It is also common knowledge that when teachers don’t participate in developing such standards they do not feel vested in what they do. Teachers were left out of the development of CCSS and a lot of teachers see problems in the standards.

3.    Administrators who are never around

Good principals are engaged with what is going on at their schools. They should be about supporting teachers and helping teachers find answers to their difficulties. They play a huge supportive role and teachers know it. When they are not around all the time they aren’t doing their jobs. Even if they are at the school they can be disengaged, always making excuses and never trying to solve the real difficulties that come up. I once walked in on an administrator who was reading a romance novel.

4.    Not in touch with individuals driving your best people nuts

I apply this to principals caught in a tough place with the rough reforms against teachers and students, especially with Common Core and high-stakes testing. But administrators can also be a wonderful source of support. Many principals have been courageous standing against these reforms or attempting to lighten the load of teachers. Their ability to still maintain their support for teachers and parents is definitely noticed and appreciated. When they speak out it matters.

5.    Not being interested in a teacher’s overall career

I remember fondly every administrator; who considered my teaching along with my overall objectives as a professional. I also remember, not so fondly, the ones who didn’t know a thing about me—who were focused only on running the school and putting out fires. Good principals seek ways to promote their teachers…whether it is on district projects or a simple understanding at the direction a teacher is looking to go. It might be something as basic as the teacher’s desire to switch grade levels. Teachers don’t need buddies in their administrators they need caring individuals who notice the teacher’s strengths and how those skills will better serve the students.

6.    Poorly run meetings

Meetings can be well-done with an organized agenda. They can bring a staff together and create a smooth running school. Or meetings can make you feel like you died and went to hell.  Click here to see the WORST PD video (1min) ever. Why didn’t teachers leave? Anyone who cares about the passing of time will notice the last scenario. How many of us have sat through boring, even unprofessional, in-service training, over nothing relevant, only to be frantically thinking of all the things we have to do back in our classrooms? This often happens during planning days in the beginning of the year.

7.    Principals who care more about themselves

I once knew of an administrator who would never have a staff meeting without reminding everyone about all the good she did for the school and how all the progress was due to the changes she made. When this administrator moved on to a different city everyone rejoiced. No one even gave her flowers upon her departure. Principals are there for support. They are a step away from the most important job which is teaching. Their job is to lift teachers and staff.

8.    Teachers never seeing the big picture or it keeps changing 

The use of the word “disruptive” when it comes to school reform has always been troubling. It is usually referencing technology replacing teaching. But the last thing children need is disruptive anything! While we can’t shelter children from change—it is a fact of life—throwing change at teachers and students is not something of which to be proud. Teachers become more organized when they understand the procedures and can add their own special features to the mix. When test agendas continually change, becoming ever more complicated, or new programs and protocol are added, without teaching preparation, it is startling to both teachers and students. Today’s “gotcha” environment is especially difficult for teachers and their students.

These are some of the issues that drive teachers to leave. I would add overcrowded schools and dilapidated school buildings, teacher isolation, and filling a teacher’s time with daily duties that could be done by volunteers, are also reasons teachers leave.

And most of all, teachers are quitting today because they recognize how harmful many of the reforms are to children. They don’t want to be any part of it. They did not go into teaching to repeatedly test children, or implement standards like Common Core when they question the value of such standards. Teaching for most of us is about helping children learn through joyful experiences.

And more and more you find impersonal schools because of the drive to convert public schools into charter schools and get rid of professional teachers. One gets the feeling today’s education reformers want credentialed teachers to quit, otherwise they would include them in the decision-making. So school administrators, I encourage you to change course and try harder to keep the real teachers in your public schools.

About the author: Nancy Bailey is the author of the book Misguided Education Reform: Debating the Impact on Students.  She has also been published in Phi Delta Kappan and Education Week. She is an activist on the issue of safe school facilities and she has a blog on her website nancyebailey.com