TEACHERS’ SICK DAYS SURGE BY 60 PER CENT IN A YEAR - BUT IT’S PUPILS WHO SUFFER
Pupils’ education suffered from a 60 per cent rise in teacher sick days and record vacancies in England last year, new data has shown.
The average number of sick days taken by all teachers rose to 6.3 days in 2021-22, up from 3.9 days in the previous year.
Almost 68 per cent of teachers took sick leave in the 2012-22 academic year, up from 45 per cent in the previous year and around 55 per cent pre-pandemic.
Teachers who took sick leave were off for an average of 9.3 days, compared with about 7.5 days prior to the pandemic.
The figures do not include non-attendance caused by isolation and shielding due to Covid-19. However, school leaders said that Covid-19 infections were still a major driver of staff sickness.
Workforce data published by the Department for Education also showed that experienced teachers are leaving the profession in record numbers and classroom vacancies hit a record high of 0.5 per cent, or 2,334, in November 2022.
It comes as pupils face missing weeks of lessons this year because of teachers striking over pay.
The National Association of Head Teachers said real-term pay cuts in the last decade, heavy workloads and the impact of “high stakes inspection and accountability measures” were driving ill-health and making teachers leave the profession.
Geoff Barton, the general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said there was a “constant struggle to fill vacancies” in schools, which was putting children’s education at risk.
Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary, said that many people continue to choose a “rewarding teaching career”, with the overall number of teachers in classrooms in England rising by 2,800 in a year to a record high of 468,371.
Teacher recruitment was bolstered by an increase in people training to join the profession during the pandemic. However, it has failed to keep up with a rise in pupils, with an additional 70,000 pupils in schools in England last year.
Shortages have been made worse by a record high of around 40,000 working-age teachers leaving the workforce last year.
Government figures showed an increase in the rate of experienced teachers leaving the profession. Only 61.6 per cent of teachers with eight years’ experience are still in work, down from 62.6 per cent a year earlier and 67.7 per cent a decade ago.
Some 52.8 per cent of teachers with 15 years experience remain, down from 57.3 per cent a decade ago.
Subjects with the biggest teacher shortages included computing, maths, business studies and music.
Jack Worth, of the National Foundation for Educational Research, said: “There are more pupils so we needed to recruit more teachers. Class sizes in secondary schools have gone up.”
Mrs Keegan said: “We know there is more to do, which is why we have generous bursaries to attract new trainees to teach priority subjects and focusing on supporting new teachers from the very start of their journey with free, high-quality, on-going professional development.”
2023-06-08T18:35:40Z dg43tfdfdgfd