Georgia’s largest teacher advocacy group has done a survey that finds many unhappy educators who’d like to quit.
They are coping with staff shortages, long hours and pay so low that many need an extra job to scrape by.
More than 80% of the 5,641 educators who responded to the online survey by the Professional Association of Georgia Educators reported bus driver shortages, with 65% of teachers noting an increase in tardy arrivals and some saying they even left class to drive a bus.
One anonymous respondent noted an “astonishing” amount of missed class time in the mornings. Only a third of freshmen taught by another respondent had arrived on time.
PAGE and others note that state funding for school transportation has flatlined over the past couple decades, leaving school districts to shoulder the rising costs by shifting resources from elsewhere, including classrooms.
State senators heard about it over the summer when they studied the state funding formula, with an eye toward amending it.
In the new survey, educators said they were affected by a shortage of school counselors and by student misbehavior. Many educators said they had to work long hours after school to keep up with school duties, and 45% said they took a second job to pay the bills.
The bottom line: 28% doubt they’ll remain in education another five years, with burnout the top reason. And they’re counseling others to steer clear, with 55% of teachers saying they wouldn’t recommend the career.
PAGE’s recommendations include boosting state funding for school safety measures and transportation, more money for counselors for special education and gifted students and ensuring teachers have more time to prepare lessons.
Still, 59% are happy enough to report that they’ll remain in the career another half decade. Satisfaction helping students was a top reason, followed by benefits such as the retirement pension.
Oddly, these numbers are a little more upbeat than those from a much larger survey before the COVID-19 pandemic made life even harder for teachers.
In 2016, the Georgia Department of Education heard from more than 53,000 respondents in an online survey that found two-thirds wouldn’t recommend the field. State school Superintendent Richard Woods commissioned the survey after seeing a state report that said 44% of new teachers had left the profession within five years of entering it.
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