According to several studies and reports, teaching is one of the most stressful jobs in the world. There have long been studies (The American Federation of Teachers’ 2017 Educator Quality of Work Life Survey) found that 61 percent of teachers said their jobs were always or often stressful—more than double the rate of non-teaching working adults—and 58 percent said they had poor mental health due to stress levels. Of course, this was before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and the transition to online learning debates over reopening, and individual safety concerns are making teachers’ mental health worse. [2]
As many teachers begin to express trauma and/or battle fatigue, it’s important that the teacher self-care conference focus on the up-and-coming research around teacher mental health in order to change policy. To facilitate that research we will engage in monthly webinars, write daily for our self-care blog, distribute our bi-monthly self-care newsletter all while engaging in our self-care conferences around research to further the work.
Webinars: Our monthly free webinars are focused on specific topics in teacher mental health. The topics range from suicide to the effects of racism on our mental health. All topics will be announced 30 days out. To get on our mailing list, please click here.
Self-Care Blog: We have recently opened a new section from our sister company, The Educator’s Room, focused solely on teacher well-being/self-care. We take original pieces from educators AND practitioners. To submit your piece, please email a clean copy to info(at)theeducatorsroom(.com). To see our pieces around self-care, please click here.
Self-Care Newsletter: Twice monthly, we publish our self-care newsletter full of research, strategies, articles and resources.To get on our mailing list, please click here.
Research: Three times a year the Teacher Self-Care Conference will publish white papers around various aspects of self-care. To take part in this research, join our Well-Being FB group, found here.
Conferences: The Teacher Self-Care Conference will continue to bring high-quality programming focused on changing policy around supports for teachers.
Works Cited
1. Mader, J. (2020, August 6). As we talk about reopening schools, are the teachers ok? The Hechinger Report. https://hechingerreport.org/as-we-talk-about-reopening-schools-are-the-teachers-ok/
2. Cox, A., Solomon, B., & Parris, D. (2018, May 8). Teacher well-being is a critical and often overlooked part of school health. https://www.childtrends.org/blog/teacher-well-being-is-a-critical-and-often-overlooked-part-of-school-health
3. Seppala, E. (2012). How the stress of disaster brings people together. Scientific American. Retrieved from https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-the-stress-of-disaster-brings-people-together/