Study:
High number of teachers plan to close the books for
good
Thursday, August 18, 2005 • BY
BEN FELLER • Associated Press
WASHINGTON -- More teachers, it seems,
are ready to leave their schools behind.
Forty percent of public school teachers
plan to exit the profession within five years, the highest
rate since at least 1990, according to a study being
released today.
The rate is expected to be even greater
among high school teachers, half of whom plan to be out of
teaching by 2010, according to the National Center for
Education Information.
Retirement is the dominant factor, as the
public teaching corps is aging fast, say surveys of teachers
in kindergarten through grade 12.
In 1996, 24 percent of teachers were age
50 or older. By 2005, 42 percent of teachers are.
"I'm ready to do what I want to do," said
Pat Jeppe, 59, a middle school teacher in Southaven, Miss.,
who plans to retire in a couple of years after teaching for
the past 35. "I finally have grandchildren and I want to be
with them and go to their school functions," Jeppe
said.
The projected turnover rate will deprive
school districts of an enormous amount of teaching
experience just as the United States pushes to get a top
instructor in every class.
The proportion of teachers with at least
25 years in the classroom has more than doubled in the past
15 years, from 12 percent to 27 percent.
The teaching corps has grown older across
the board because more people are moving into the field in
their 30s and 40s, said Emily Feistritzer, president of the
center, a private organization that specializes in survey
research of school trends.
"We're going to have tremendous turnover,
but I happen to think it's a tremendous opportunity rather
than a hand-wringing time," she told the Associated
Press.
"We'll have 40 percent of the teaching
force replaced by mid-career switchers and people with life
experience, people with altruistic motives for coming into
teaching," Feistritzer said.
In 1990, 74 percent of teachers predicted
they would still be in the classroom five years later. In
the surveys, that total dropped to 66 percent in 1996 and 60
percent this year.
Overall, 83 percent of teachers say they
are satisfied with their jobs, a level that has held steady
over the past 15 years. Yet, beyond retirement, teachers say
they have plenty of reasons to consider leaving: concerns
over pay, dissatisfaction with school bureaucracy or plans
to work in another education job, among other
factors.
In New Jersey, which ranks among the top
nationally for teacher pay, union officials said the
survey's turnover number seems high. Yet their own surveys
have found as many as one-third of teachers will exit within
five years, a big concern for a state where about one-third
of teachers are in their first years on the job.
Last year, for example, the number of new
teachers leaving the profession surpassed for the first time
the number of those retiring, according to the New Jersey
Education Association, the predominant teachers
union.
"For some, it may not be the right career
choice, or they may leave to have children or for other
personal reasons," said Steve Wollmer, an NJEA
spokesman.
But, Wollmer added, too many others are
leaving for "preventable reasons." They cite inadequate
mentoring or support from administration and colleagues for
their departure, he said.
The national survey of 1,028 public
school teachers, taken in March through June, has a margin
of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage
points.
Star-Ledger writer John Mooney contributed to this
report.
© 2005 The Star-Ledger. Used by NJ.com with
permission.
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