Teachers left classroom in droves in the fall of 2021 after flocking back to school in 2020 in the pandemic’s wake, UVA researchers say. (Illustration by Emily Faith Morgan, University Communications)
Virginia public schools saw significant swings in teacher turnover follow the pandemic’s onslaught.
New research published by the EdPolicyWorks research center at the University of Virginia found both the lowest and highest levels of teacher attrition in the two years following the arrival of COVID-19 when reviewing the decade of data between 2012 to 2022.
“This swing from the highest to the lowest return rates equates to roughly 3,500 additional teachers not returning in fall 2021,” said the study’s lead researcher, Luke Miller, a research associate professor in UVA’s School of Education and Human Development.
In partnership with the Virginia Department of Education, the research team analyzed data from 132 public school divisions across Virginia. In the fall of 2020, 82.6% of Virginia public school teachers returned to the same school where they were teaching when the pandemic hit the prior school year. This was the highest rate of return in any school year between 2012 and 2022.
Conversely, only 78.9% of teachers returned to their same school in fall 2021.
The researchers tracked the number of teachers who returned to teach at the same school and those who “exhibit mobility,” or do not return to classrooms. That category includes teachers who leave the profession entirely, as well as those who transfer to another school or to a different non-classroom-teaching role at the same school. These roles might include becoming a reading or math specialist or an assistant principal, for example.
The study also included departure rates – the number of teachers who leave the profession. Across the state, Miller found that an increase in the departure rate accounted for almost half of the increase in teacher turnover.
According to Miller, there are specific advantages to teachers returning.
“Turnover challenges the strength of relationships among the teachers, as well as between teachers and students,” Miller said. “These relationships are key to making the school a good place to work and learn.”
Luke Miller, a research associate professor in UVA’s School of Education and Human Development, said 82.6% of Virginia public school teachers returned to the same school in 2020 but only 78.8% returned the next year. (Contributed photo)
Miller said that when teachers leave, they take with them specific knowledge about the school’s students and community that can improve teaching and learning. Often, teachers hired to replace those who leave have less or no prior classroom experience, Miller said.
Virginia mirrors many other states across the nation in grappling with a shortage of teachers. According to Miller, understanding teacher retention is a key part of addressing the teacher shortage.
“First and foremost, tracking these trends tells us whether we are doing enough to retain teachers,” Miller said. “The trends tell us very clearly that we are not.”
According to Miller, these analyses can also highlight areas where retention efforts are particularly falling short. The team found that, across Virginia, the departure rates of Black and Hispanic teachers increased more between 2019 and 2021 than they did for White teachers, and more so for female than male teachers.
Research has consistently shown that teacher turnover is higher in schools with more students from economically disadvantaged and minority backgrounds. In the study, the researchers found that the differences between those schools and wealthier, whiter schools have decreased with the pandemic. That’s not necessarily good news, because the narrowing difference was caused by high turnover in the whiter, wealthier schools, and not an increase in retention in the less-advantaged schools.
“We shouldn’t look at [the narrowing of this difference] as some sort of silver lining, as it was achieved with increased teacher turnover rather than increased teacher retention,” Miller said. “The pandemic is undoing efforts to increase the diversity of Virginia’s teacher workforce.”
The study is a part of an ongoing partnership between EdPolicyWorks, a collaboration between the UVA School of Education and Human Development and the Batten School of Leadership and Public Policy, and the Virginia Department of Education to study the impact of the pandemic on Virginia’s public schools. Previous research examined student enrollment and mobility, student performance, and English learners.
Miller and his team are currently analyzing data on teacher licensure, students with disabilities, special education teachers and transitions to post-secondary education.
