Petition to Do More to Support Our Teachers

Petition addressed to: James

The Goal: To increase job satisfaction amongst teachers

The Problem: In the UK, teacher job satisfaction is lower than 22 other comparable countries. Considering the fact that we sit at the very bottom of the table when it comes to teacher job satisfaction, it isn’t all that surprising that we’re in the middle of an ongoing teacher shortage. Teachers are leaving the profession at a worryingly fast pace. 10% of our educators call it quits every year, and the problem shows no signs of letting up.

The reason for this dissatisfaction with the career is clear: teachers workloads are unmanageable and pay is unreasonable. A survey conducted in 2017 found that the average working time for teachers is around 54 hours and that around 1 in 5 teachers work over 60 hours per week. This is over the legal threshold set by the European time directive by a large margin.

The consequences of this are that teachers are not only unhappy with their jobs, but they’re also suffering as a result. Studies have found that rates of mental health issues such as anxiety and depression among teachers are significantly higher than in other employment sectors.

The Solution: Bolster teacher pay scales across the board to compensate them more fairly. Take action to reduce workloads by changing guidelines on things like assessments, and by providing school funding for more support staff to help with lesson planning and preparation.

https://wordmint.com/ already helps teachers to reduce their workloads by providing free access to helpful tools like a bingo card maker, word search maker, and more.