Introduction
In 2019, the Kentucky Department of Education administered the Impact Kentucky survey statewide. In it were more than 65 questions that provide clarity about the experiences of educators across the Commonwealth. This brief uses two questions from that survey to provide context about the current state of educator emotional well-being in Kentucky.
Defining Emotional Well-being
Student, staff, and leadership well-being are inextricably linked. Schools can only support students and their needs to the degree that staff and leaders are supported and well themselves. An intentional focus on well-being is crucial now more than ever.
Often, well-being is discussed in terms of what it is not: stress, chronic health concerns, or burnout. However, focusing on what it means to have low well-being means that programs address the side effects rather than proactively building well-being (Grant et al., 2007). We define well-being among teachers as a wide-encompassing idea that includes teacher mental, physical, emotional, and spiritual health. Individual, school, and community factors influence teacher well-being.
Teacher well-being can manifest in a number of ways including feeling balanced, supported, recognized, and encouraged to solve problems. Teachers with high levels of emotional well-being form closer relationships with their students, which is a factor in student learning and success in school (Roberts & Kim, 2019). There are also studies that show that emotional well-being is related to teacher retention - teachers who are not feeling supported in terms of well-being are more likely to leave the classroom (Harmsen et al., 2018).
Given the recent pandemic, it is important for leaders across Kentucky to reflect on the emotional well-being of teachers in their schools. In this brief we share the state of educator emotional well-being in Kentucky before the pandemic to provide context for leaders.
The Impact KY Survey
Shortly before the March 2020 COVID-19 shelter in place order educators reported on various aspects of their experiences working in schools. The 2020 Impact Kentucky Working Conditions Survey was administered in all Kentucky schools between January 13 and February 21, 2020. In total, 43,089 educators responded to the survey (an 85% response rate). Various constructs were included in the survey such as school climate, school leadership, managing student behavior. Importantly, the survey included two questions about emotional well-being:
How concerned are you about your emotional well-being as a result of your work? How concerned are you about the emotional well-being of your colleagues as a result of their work?
These questions were intended to get a broad understanding of educators’ perceptions of their personal well-being and the well-being of their colleagues.
Key Findings
Finding 1
The majority of educators in Kentucky are concerned about their own well-being and the well-being of their colleagues as a result of their work (51% and 59%, respectively).
More than half of educators (51%) in Kentucky reported being concerned about their emotional well-being as a result of their work, and 28% reported being very concerned (i.e., quite a bit 17% or a great deal 11%). While educators are concerned about their own well-being as a result of their job, they are overwhelmingly more concerned about the well-being of their colleagues. Nearly 3 out of 5 teachers indicated being concerned about the well-being of their colleagues. This finding was consistent across groups and schools.
The possible reasons for this are numerous. Low emotional well-being could be the result of negative working conditions, poor school culture, high levels of stress, feelings of poor safety, the broader political discourse around schools and teachers, among other reasons.
As described in the previous section, the effects of low educator well-being may also be vast. Teachers who are concerned about their emotional well-being may struggle to build relationships with their students, consider leaving the profession, or experience physical symptoms that make their jobs, and lives, more difficult.
Finding 2
Teachers share more concern regarding emotional well-being than administrators and other educational professionals.
While the majority of teachers expressed concern about their own emotional well-being (53%) and the well-being of their colleagues (59%), assistant principals and principals responded with less concern about their own emotional well-being (35% and 32%, respectively) and the well-being of their colleagues (45% and 41%, respectively). This difference in experience is important for school administrators to understand. Teachers’ experiences are clearly different from those of administrators, yet administrators are charged with supporting teachers.
Administrators influence student learning through school culture (Grissom et al., 2021; Louis et al., 2010). Having a positive, supportive school culture is one way to support teachers’ emotional well-being so that they can better support their learners in the classroom. If principals’ and assistant principals’ emotional well-being is low, they cannot support the well-being of their teachers. And, the survey data shows that assistant principals and principals are less concerned about the well-being of their colleagues. If they are not concerned about the well-being of others in their building, they are likely not going to provide support or invest in programs that may improve teachers’ well-being. This can contribute to a culture where teachers feel like they are not being heard. Thus, administrators should use interviews, focus groups, or other empathy exercises to better understand the needs of their teachers so that they can better support their emotional well-being and create a positive school culture. Listening and meeting the needs of teachers is a key strategy for principals and assistant principals in building a culture that makes teachers feel valued, thereby contributing to their decision to stay in the profession (Habegger, 2008).
Finding 3
Emotional well-being varies considerably across districts and schools.
The responses to the two well-being questions on the Impact Kentucky survey varied across schools from 0% of teachers being concerned about their emotional well-being in one school to 100% of teachers being concerned about their emotional well-being in another. This suggests that there are some school and community factors that relate to teachers’ sense of well-being and is consistent with the finding in (Brigham et al., 2018) that individual as well as school or community factors such as leadership, policy, and working conditions affect teacher well-being.
Just as teachers at individual schools have different experiences that influence their emotional well-being, leaders should consider individualized interventions to support emotional well-being. Rather than doing a generic wellness program, leaders should ask teachers in order to understand the root causes of teachers’ emotional needs. Then, support programs will be targeted to the specific needs of that community.
Finding 4
Concern about emotional well-being is higher in schools with higher levels of poverty.
The higher the level of poverty in a school (as measured by the percentage of students eligible for free/reduced price lunches at a school), the higher the concern among teachers. This trend was consistent across both well-being questions.
Teacher turnover is higher in high poverty schools. This is not because of student characteristics, rather, because of “poor working conditions that make it difficult for them to teach and for their students to learn†(Simon & Johnson, 2015, p. 1). The working conditions that improve teacher retention are similar to those that improve teacher well-being: meaningful relationships, supportive leaders, and a positive school culture. While there is little evidence about the direct relationship between teacher well-being and teacher retention, addressing teacher well-being may also support teacher retention.
Next Steps
In the 2019 Impact Kentucky survey, the majority of teachers responded with some level of concern about their own emotional well-being and the well-being of their colleagues. However, levels of concern varied by individual teacher characteristics and by school and district characteristics. A theme underlying these findings is that leaders need to pay attention to the individual factors that drive concern about emotional well-being in their schools. Every school, community, and teacher is unique and only through targeted interventions will emotional well-being be improved.
Anecdotally, throughout the pandemic teachers across the nation and the Commonwealth have shared stories about a decreasing sense of overall well-being. This brief provided a snapshot of educator emotional well-being prior to the pandemic. With this understanding we will be able to better understand the shift in emotional well-being that likely occurred as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the coming months, the Kentucky Department of Education will create a series of briefs on emotional well-being that include:
- Exploring underlying factors associated with educator well-being
- Investigating school climate and teacher well-being
- Examining the role of school leaders in supporting emotional well-being
By building a deeper understanding of the emotional well-being of educators across Kentucky, the Department hopes that progress can be made toward improving it.