Sometimes it doesn't even feel like work! However, spare a thought for colleagues who are not in this position. We all know that even at a low level if there are things in your workplace that affect you every single day, it's only natural that they will impact your outlook, motivation, performance and mental health.
Teaching is a profession that so many people experience a calling for and one that they greatly enjoy – the interaction with pupils, seeing them progress and grow, and helping them to understand how they fit into the world. It is often the peripheral parts of the role that cause the problems that can see good teachers leaving their jobs and schools struggling to replace them.
Culture is the heart of the school
A school's culture can be transformational. Done right, it can propel educators and students to new levels of accomplishment and achievement; done wrong, it can be utterly destructive, affecting everything from well-being, attendance, staff turnover and student outcomes
A great school culture takes effort and simply cannot be left to chance. And without good staff, a school has little to offer its students or its wider community. Staff are the lifeblood of everything curriculum and pastoral-based in a school, so why would not looking after them properly even be a consideration? Time and money cannot be the only excuses. Some of the most effective tools to create a good school culture do not even have a monetary cost: being listened to, supported by managers, gaining recognition for good work, access to constructive help or feedback, practical assistance to alleviate workload issues, and kind words of encouragement are all free, but sadly, often omitted.
From my perspective, in the UK school trust of which I am Chair, we strive to make our school culture one that welcomes and nurtures staff and gives them a voice. We understand that teachers are learners too and try to support them with professional development, training and opportunities to gain additional mentoring or secondment experience in the other schools in our trust. We aim to listen and work together to improve where we can. Do we always get it right? Perhaps not, but by collaborating and being prepared to learn from each other, everyone feels they have agency and can make an active contribution.
A missed opportunity for reform?
Since the pandemic, everyone, regardless of profession, is more aware of the importance of looking after mental health and well-being, and schools are certainly at the centre of this. Even now, teachers are still dealing with the fallout from lockdowns and the effects that time away from school has had on their students, such as decreased concentration, lapsed motivation, poor attendance and general anxiety. Teacher training, however, was no preparation for this and it has caused untold amounts of stress and well-being problems for teachers too.
In this climate, creating the ideal school culture is far from easy. The much hoped-for post-pandemic wake-up call for reform in the mechanisms of how we educate young people did not materialise and instead, everyone plunged into the mad panic of 'catching up'. Schools cannot ignore this and continue to heap pressure onto teachers' shoulders. This is precisely the situation where a supportive culture is essential. Everyone is in this together; nobody should feel such acute pressure without having anyone to turn to for support.
What now
As so many turn away from teaching, staff well-being must now rise to be one of the top priorities for schools as they seek to attract and retain good teachers. I know of schools taking various approaches to making their offer more attractive where increasing pay is not an option. For example, one is adding five minutes to the school day to create extra summer holidays and I have heard of others increasing opportunities for more flexible working conditions and part-time roles.
But is this enough? Ultimately, the way to improve teachers' well-being is to reduce their workload. And despite so many schools doing great things with technology to lighten the burden, like signposting teachers to apps for audio feedback, solutions that auto-mark tests, a ban on out-of-hours emails, AI solutions to help with report writing and more, I can't help but think that the real problem is the education systems we work within. But until the time comes when widespread education reform occurs, we need to work with what we have and treat staff as humans, use technology to our advantage and create a workplace where employees will feel valued and appreciated.
