Working during the coronavirus pandemic has left Minnesota educators feeling stressed, overwhelmed and thinking about quitting, according to survey results released Monday by the state teachers union.
Those having the worst time are working on hybrid schedules, with students learning both in-person and from home at the same time, Education Minnesota found.
Union president Denise Specht said in a statement that schools should take any unnecessary tasks off teachers’ plates and stop requiring them to teach students in multiple places at once.
“That arrangement may have seemed like a good idea in August, but it’s not working in October and it may drive out hundreds of teachers by May,” she said.
29 PERCENT ‘THINKING ABOUT QUITTING OR RETIRING’
The union said the online survey fielded 9,723 responses between Sept. 23 and Oct. 5. About 83 percent were teachers, with nurses, counselors and aides also responding.
Overall, 29 percent said they were “thinking about quitting or retiring.”
“Our public schools won’t function if thousands of educators burn out and leave. It’s time to adjust,” Specht said.
However, retirements since May actually are down compared to 2018 and 2019, according to the Teachers Retirement Association. The pension plan did see an increase in retirement applications last month, but applications overall are roughly on par with the last two years.
Those figures generally correspond with teacher retirement numbers across the country, defying worries about a looming workforce crisis.
MOST EDUCATORS WORKING REMOTELY AND IN-PERSON, ACCORDING TO SURVEY
Most educators in the survey — 61 percent — were working with students both in-person and remotely.
Asked how they’re feeling about their work, 79 percent said “stressed” and 73 percent said “overwhelmed.”
Just 12 percent of respondents said they felt “happy” about their work, including 19 percent of those working in-person full-time.
“We love our work, but it has taken up every minute of our lives,” White Bear Lake special education teacher Erika Jagiella said at an Education Minnesota news conference Friday. “Asking teachers to teach in multiple formats is not sustainable.”
Negative feelings and workload concerns were somewhat lower for those working with all their students in-person every day. However, those working from home said they felt much safer than those working with students at school.
Anoka-Hennepin English teacher Jodi Anderson-Wolhaupter told reporters Friday that her teacher husband was given approval to work from home for health reasons, but she was denied early in the school year. Rather than risk her husband’s health to work on Anoka-Hennepin’s hybrid schedule, she took unpaid leave.
“The denial of my request to work remotely effectively nullified my husband’s accommodation,” she said.
UNIONS PRESSING FOR SPECIAL ARRANGEMENTS
Teachers unions across the state and country have been pressing their employers to negotiate special agreements around working conditions and benefits during the pandemic. In some of Minnesota’s largest districts, they’ve bargained for safety measure, limits on workloads and live instruction, extra pay, and child care and sick leave benefits.
Union leaders also have been lobbying for more federal money to enable schools to operate safely, with stronger testing protocols and enough staff and space to teach in-person while maintaining enough distance to prevent the virus from spreading.
“We need to make sure we’re listening to what educators are telling us,” Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, said Friday.
Despite a surge in coronavirus cases in Minnesota, only 11 public and private schools have reported outbreaks involving five or more infected students and staff in their buildings, according to a Thursday report from the Department of Health.