Tags: Why Do Teachers Quit
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One of the most popular search queries that has sent people to my blog lately has been “why do teachers quit?” Doing a quick search of my site tells me that I have a number of articles that reference this idea, but have not yet explored exactly why it is that many teachers choose to quit teaching. This weekend, I will write two articles on that very topic. Today, we’ll consider the question Why Do Teachers Quit? and explore some invalid reasons they do so. Tomorrow, we will consider the same question and explore some of the valid reasons for quitting. You won’t want to miss it. Next weekend, we will consider How Do We Keep Teachers From Quitting? which should be a great follow-up.Before entering this discussion, I think it would be a good idea to give you a little bit of background and point you to some articles I have previously written that address this concept.
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For another look at quitting teaching, see my article 9 Reasons To Quit Teaching (And 10 Reasons To Stick).
One of the most popular search queries that has sent people to my blog lately has been “why do teachers quit?” Doing a quick search of my site tells me that I have a number of articles that reference this idea, but have not yet explored exactly why it is that many teachers choose to quit teaching. This weekend, I will write two articles on that very topic. Today, we’ll consider the question Why Do Teachers Quit? and explore some invalid reasons they do so. Tomorrow, we will consider the same question and explore some of the valid reasons for quitting. You won’t want to miss it. Next weekend, we will consider How Do We Keep Teachers From Quitting? which should be a great follow-up.Before entering this discussion, I think it would be a good idea to give you a little bit of background and point you to some articles I have previously written that address this concept.
- The Dip
- Where Have All The Good Teachers Gone
- Nine Reasons To Quit Teaching (And Ten Reasons To Stick)
At the outset, I would like to ask for as much audience participation as possible. This is a key issue that I think all educators should approach with great passion. You who are reading this — YES YOU — have thoughts on the issue. Share them. Just leave a comment below and let this be a conversation among professionals. With that out of the way, here we go.
Why Do Teachers Quit Teaching?
First of all, I think we need to break the reasons down into valid and invalid justifications for quitting. Thought I have previously listed some of the invalid reasons, I want to look at them all somewhat more in-depth.
Invalid Reasons To Quit Teaching
- Bad students/administrators/curriculum/demographics
This argument is simply an attempt to place the blame on someone other than the individual teacher. This is the most common reasons that teachers who have been teaching for quite a while retire. “Kids are different … Parents are different.” “No Child Left behind is a worthless program that does nothing but make public schools worse.” “Poor nonwhite parents don’t care about their kids.” These are all symptoms that point at something the teacher is doing ineffectively. Until we face the person in the mirror, we will keep finding excuses to not love our job.
- Too much paperwork/responsibility
Another way to say this is “I’m unorganized and don’t have a system to handle this much responsibility.” This is probably the most common complaint I have heard from new teachers. This is not initially the fault of the individual teacher, though if it persists, the blame shifts. Initially, it is the fault of the more experienced teachers around that teacher who don’t offer any help. After time, if the condition persists, it becomes solely the fault of the teacher. There are plenty of resources available online that can help you learn how to be more organized.
- Too much negativity
While this is a common state of many teachers in schools, we don’t have to hang around with negative people. I avoid the teachers lounge for this very reason. People who watch the news all the time tend to be negative about things much more frequently than people who don’t. One concept I picked up from The 4-Hour Workweek is to simply ask, “What’s new in the world?” when you meet people. If something major is happening, they’ll generally let you know. The information that is available right as an event is unfolding is generally not very accurate anyway. Go out of your way to find excellent educators to emulate, and you will discover that most of the time, they are very positive people.
- Not enough time
This ties back in with organization above. It is really a matter of priorities, though. It’s been said before, but is worth reiterating: Everybody has the same amount of time. Those who are effective have figured out how to organize their life more effectively. Some simple steps to handling this can be found in this article, but they are: (1) Declutter, (2) Prioritize, (3) Befriend the trash, and (4) Practice selective ignorance. It’s amazing how much time these simple concepts will free up in your life. - Not enough respect/not enough pay
Here is another symptom of a much, much deeper problem. The deeper problem is a valid reason to quit teaching. If you quit teaching because of one or both of these two reasons, you are simply creating an excuse. You need to dig deeper and find out what the real reason is that you’re quitting!
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Comments
Miss A writes:
Great post. You know, you really should write a book.
These are not good reasons to quit, but please understand other teachers perspectives. You teacher band, so a lot of your grading/paperwork is performance based and prob can be graded/evaluated right then and there.
I personally believe that English Teachers and History teachers have it the worst in the school setting. Planning, grading and other administrative tasks are time consuming. Yes, a organization system helps this. But most teachers in these areas spend a great amount of time at home working on stuff for these classes. ex: Lecture notes, grading essays, grading tests, grading projects, organizing activities and prepping to minimize transition time. If you don’t take the work home, your students don’t benefit. So teaching is a time/life consuming task.
I agree with you about the negativity. I stay in my classroom most of the time. Especially on lunch breaks. You need peace and quiet. And the Lounge serves as a relief place for most tachers. For me, this was resolved with my blog.
Keep, up the good work!
Author Comment
Joel writes:
Good points. What about using the concept of outsourcing and get other people to grade your papers?
I remember having classes where we would exchange papers and grade them. “But students might cheat?” Yes, they will cheat!
If you don’t put too much of a weight on daily grades in your grading procedure, this problem can be alleviated. This way the quizzes and tests will really determine results. Plus, some students learn better by just being given the answers and then going back to figure out why those answers are right.
It’s at least worth a try, huh?
Chris writes:
There are certainly some truths here, but overall it is smug and facile, and I find a lot to disagree with.
Just to pick one, curriculum DOES matter. If the state standards and associated mandatory tests and textbooks are completely inappropriate for your students it creates nightmares. I will never teach world history to poor children again after this year — it simply does not make sense to try and teach the finer points of Lenin’s New Economic Policy to children who do not yet know the difference between the government and a company.
Another: Some students work in places where violence is a daily occurance and many, many kids and parents have mental and emotional illnesses. Can this “negativity’ be avoided by just not going to the lounge?
Finally, on paperwork: I know a 20-year vet of special ed who says the time now required to fill out IEPs is impossible to do and still teach. Is she just disorganized? Or is she perhaps being expected to do more with less because of the stranglehold our state taxpayers put on education funds 30 years ago? (California).
Author Comment
Joel writes:
Chris, somehow you missed the point. I am not saying that all negativity can be avoided, but to make a conscious effort to avoid negative people (I specifically mentioned negative teachers, for instance), will work wonders as far as your own personal outlook on life.
The special education teacher you mentioned probably could benefit greatly by going to a different district where they have figured out that teachers should be teaching. The same thing holds true with the curriculum.
chris writes:
Of course, I understand what you meant about avoiding negativity where possible. My beef, however, was with the whole tone of the article, starting with the word “invalid.” Maybe if you said it more gently, like you do elsewhere on here (i.e., before you quit try these solutions, etc.) it would have seemed less condescending.
It feels like you are putting everything back on the teacher — WORK SMARTER NOT HARDER — when the fact is there are very real issues in many many schools that are leading reasonable, hard-working people to quit. It also seems glib — just clean your desk, avoid the lunch room, move to another district, etc.
Essentially, this is a silly construct. Not enough pay isn’t a valid reason to quit a job? Huh? Maybe it was enough when you were a single 25-year-old but now you’re a single parent supporting an elderly parent, too. Want to quit? INVALID. DIG DEEPER.