Richmond Teacher Residency program attempts to combat all-time high burnout and resignation rates

Lindsey West
April 13, 2022

RICHMOND, Va. – Teacher burnout rates are at an all-time high according to the National Education Association who surveyed 2,690 teachers to find 32% of teachers have left their professions earlier than expected due to COVID-19. The Richmond Teacher Residency program is working against teacher burnout and attempting to combat the expected increased teacher shortage. 

The NEA relates teacher burnout in conjunction with the pandemic but teachers like Justin Baber, a 5th grade teacher at Richmond Virtual Academy, do not wholly blame their experience with burnout on COVID-19. 

“I would give [COVID-19] about 75% of the fault for burnout,” Baber said. 

Baber’s most difficult aspect of teaching has been strict curriculums provided by school administrations. 

“It puts teachers in a situation where we're not able to cater to the students as much we're told to,” Baber said, “We're still having to teach grade level material to some of these kids who are a year to two years behind because of the situation they've been put in.” 

Noticing his colleagues reflecting trends from the NEA survey, Baber speaks on behalf of a teacher colleague who has combated burnout by teaching for a couple years at a time and leaving to work in the private sector and repeating the cycle. 

Baber has been a teacher for two years and has considered leaving.

“I think that everyone has their thoughts once in a while,” Baber said.

“We've read many reports, particularly in recent years, of medical professionals and veterinarians and other kinds of healthcare workers broadly experiencing burnout and compassion fatigue and we haven't seen quite as much dedicated in the education space for the fact that we're also in helping professions,” said Adria Hoffman, a Professor in VCU School of Education and President of Virginia Association of Colleges and Teacher Educators (VACTE). 

Hoffman compares teacher recognition to that of healthcare workers and believes teacher recognition does not reach that of healthcare professionals. 

“When we're serving families and students who are experiencing adverse experiences, even traumatic experiences, we are also at risk of burnout and compassion, fatigue, and we haven't quite seen the attention paid to our profession during the pandemic that we've seen paid to healthcare workers,” Hoffman said. 

Wenda Thompson, lead secondary residency coordinator for the Richmond Teacher Residency Program, agrees that society’s response to teachers during the pandemic does not provide enough empathy. Before working at an administrative level, Thompson admits to experiencing burnout as a former classroom teacher. 

“I love my job. I love teaching. I love the teacher-student interaction. I love being able to see the light bulbs go off. All of those great things, but it was a lot.” Thompson said, “I feel like a lot of it was because I was doing so much. I was pouring in 115% and not getting enough back and I kept doing it because of love.” 

Thompson taught virtually when the pandemic surged and cited the challenges it presented.

 “When you’re teaching to a bunch of squares and turning on the cameras wasn’t a requirement, it was suggested, it’s like you’re talking to yourself,” Thompson said.

Thompson places a large emphasis on the need for community among teachers as the main source for combating burnout. Although Thompson felt burnout intensify during COVID-19, similar to Justin Baber, she experienced teacher burnout pre-pandemic as well. 

“My administration had high expectations, my department had high expectations, my students…needed a lot from me, parents needed a lot from me as well and that was when things started getting hairy,” Thompson said. 

Thompson’s colleague, Kendra Johnson, did not experience teacher burnout when she was in the classroom. 

Johnson, the anti-racist, teaching, leading and transformation specialist at VCU Center for Teacher Leadership, believes burnout and stress are natural responses but did not experience these emotions in direct relation to teaching. 

“That’s not to say there weren’t times where I didn’t grow a little bit weary.” Johnson said, “When you are in a profession that is so people facing with such big social significance, you experience a myriad of emotions. I was thankfully surrounded by a network of people who restored me. That included administration, mentors on staff, friends on staff. I know that that’s not always the case for a lot of people but I do consider myself very lucky to have such a supportive network.” 

The Richmond Teacher Residency Program, directed by Kim McKnight, is working to combat burnout by emphasizing the need for community amongst teachers. Some of these methods include holding mixers for teachers to become friends with one another, partnering new teachers with veteran teachers, and providing resources to explain processes to new teachers that may have otherwise been overlooked. 

“The work we do at the center for teacher leadership is trying to uplift that.” McKnight said, “And how do we build more teacher leaders and really think about the work that we do in ways to enhance it so that we lead to more student achievement and really for our teachers to have great experiences, we want support systems.”

McKnight attributes her early symptoms of teacher burnout to struggling in finding a work-life balance. 

“I was struggling with where one part ends and one part begins because I was working most weekends most nights, but I was pouring myself into my students,” McKnight said. 

McKnight relates the teachers she oversees to the NEA survey as many veteran teachers have left during COVID-19 as they did not expect for their careers to become virtual. 

“I will say though, what I've also seen is that those that have made it through the last two years have this renewed sense of the purpose of education,” McKnight said. 

Johnson agrees with McKnight, “We have some folks who are retiring just because they are seasoned vets and rightfully deserve a break. With the teachers we support, no, I haven’t noticed a tremendous amount of turnover.” 

Staff members at the Center of Teacher Leaders and Richmond Teacher Residency Program believe teacher stability will soon start to increase. On the contrary, Leigh McClean, a research assistant professor in the Center for Educational and Social Policy at the University of Delaware, believes interest in becoming a teacher will continue to drop. 

“Interest in teaching, students that are coming into undergraduate degrees, rates of interest in teaching as a career are dropping pretty significantly,” McClean said. 

“In my data, teacher’s mental health symptomatology, so depression, anxiety, are skyrocketing, they’re increasing exponentially. It’s pretty extreme.” McClean said, “Levels of burnout are increasing…These things really contribute to teachers’ intentions to leave the field.” 

Researchers, including McLean, have noticed trends in teacher burnout steadily increasing regardless of COVID-19. 

“It’s definitely possible in the next five years or so, we could experience a crisis level teacher shortage but it remains to be seen whether or not that actually happens on a national scale,” McLean said.