More than six in ten of them described leadership practices that hastened their withdrawal
Teacher shortages are affecting school systems in countries across the world.
Governments have responded with initiatives to attract graduates into teaching. While much attention has focused on increasing supply, far less attention has been paid to why experienced teachers decide to leave, despite the high costs of turnover in recruitment, training and lost continuity.
Administrative data records that a teacher left, not why, or what might have kept them in their job. Leaving is treated as a single event, when for many teachers it is closer to a slow unravelling. Some step back gradually, stepping down from promoted posts or moving to part-time hours before they formally resign. This a shift that workforce statistics may count as a retention success rather than the early stage of an exit. The result is a policy conversation too often weighted towards the front door of the profession, while the back door swings largely unexamined.
My colleagues and I interviewed 63 teachers from publicly funded Scottish schools who had left teaching, or cut their hours or responsibilities, before retirement age. Of these, 36 had left altogether and 27 had reduced their hours, in most cases within the previous 18 months. On average they had around 18 years of teaching experience. We excluded people who left for unavoidable reasons, because we wanted to understand exits that might have been avoided. Although we did not speak to teachers who stayed under similar pressures, the pattern was consistent across accounts and warrants attention.
Leaving was seldom sudden. Of the 36 who left, 25 described dissatisfaction building over months or years through rising workload, challenging pupil behaviour and the experience of not being heard by school leaders. Separately, 25 of the 36 were “reluctant leavers”: teachers who wanted to stay but could no longer carry on. Many described exhaustion, disturbed sleep and anxiety. Some reached a health crisis that needed medical help. Sixteen left with no other paid work to go to.
Resignations like these are usually recorded as “voluntary”, which implies the teacher chose to go. That label hides what is driving departures and points policy in the wrong direction. A teacher tempted away might be retained with better pay or prospects; one who wanted to stay needs the conditions that pushed them out to change. Nearly half of our participants discussed accepting, or expecting, lower earnings on leaving, which suggests pay was not what pushed them out.
Reducing hours is often seen as a way of keeping experienced people. Among the 27 who cut back, however, many described it as a way of coping rather than flourishing. For some it was a planned exit route, buying time while they explored alternatives and retrained. For others it kept exhaustion manageable. They reduced hours or gave up promoted posts to survive. As one put it, “I’m still absolutely exhausted on those three days, but I see it as containable.”
My colleagues and I carried out a second analysis of 58 teachers outside senior leadership (32 of them leavers). We found that more than six in ten of them described leadership practices that hastened their withdrawal. Only two felt genuinely heard by senior leaders. In some cases, headteachers who found practical ways to accommodate family or health needs kept teachers in their employment for longer. However, that help rested on one person and did not always survive a change in leadership. Only one of the 32 leavers had a formal exit interview, and most reported no attempt to establish why they left.
Our evidence suggests requests to downscale should be treated as an opportunity to explore sustainability, not as closed cases. Leaders cannot always say yes, but they often shape the point at which teachers decide they can no longer stay. Participants described council decisions that limited what school leaders could offer, and leaders who cared but lacked the means to act.
Leaders need preparation in supportive conversations and in handling flexible working, together with the authority and resource to act on what they learn. Arrangements that work should be documented so that they survive a change of headteacher. Collecting exit information independently would improve data quality and fill a gap that most leavers experienced, but it needs funding. Acting on what it shows also takes time and attention that stretched leaders may lack.
Scotland’s teachers have been promised relief, but not yet. A national deal reached in March 2026 will cut the time teachers in Scotland spend in front of a class by 90 minutes a week, but primary and special school teachers will not see it until August 2027 and secondary teachers two years later. Who will pay for it remains unresolved.
Councils estimate the change will cost up to £310 million a year. In October, Scotland’s education secretary Màiri McAllan told a Holyrood committee that the government had yet to cost the policy, but that a figure of that size was neither accurate nor affordable.
Even when it arrives, less time in front of a class will not, on its own, change what the work demands or whether teachers’ concerns are heard. Workforce plans need to look beyond recruiting more teachers, or paying them better, to replace those who cannot continue, to attend closely to what the work has become and the conditions that could make it more sustainable.
Moira Hulme, Professor of Education, University of the West of Scotland