Education MN says more teachers leaving profession during the school year than in years past

Educators say this has been one of the most difficult years of teaching in decades.

The stress and anxiety that came with teaching in Minnesota schools last school year is nothing compared to this year, many teachers say.

"We’ve been hearing stories all over the state where educators just two months into the academic year are as exhausted and stressed out as they typically are at the end of the school year," said Denise Specht, president of Education Minnesota, the state union representing educators.

Specht says the result is teachers leaving the profession.

"We are hearing examples of teachers who are going to their union or going to their employer saying I want out of my contract and I want out of it today," Specht said.

Asked how abnormal it is to have an educator leave in the middle of the school year, Specht said, "This is extremely unusual."

A recent RAND Corporation survery found one out of six American teachers was likely to leave the profession before the pandemic, now one in four is considering quitting.

"This is due to exhaustion and stress, the mental health of educators right now is extremely fragile and I’m very, very worried for the future of this profession," Specht said.

"This year we have seen a lot more teachers either leave school, leave teaching completely or switch their district because each district is able to handle their COVID protocols differently," Alex Liuzzi said.

Liuzzi leads PELSB, the Minnesota Professional Educator Licensing and Standards Board.

He says if a teacher leaves during a contract, there could be ethics violations.

Although, he says some grace is being offered now because of the pandemic.

"There is a teacher code of ethics that says a teacher will not break their contract, but like all of the issues on our code of ethics, those come before our standards and licensing committee and we review them on a case by case basis," he said.

"We can’t say there would be no action, or this action would be taken instead of something else, but we have been talking to teachers to let them know we have to open a case when these come in," he shared.

He hopes funds the legislature provided last year for a teacher mentorship program will help keep teachers in the classroom.

"We believe that’s a great start, and that it can start building the systems to be able to provide to more teachers, so that maybe we could keep them in the profession," he added.