Teacher retention an issue in Georgia, situation could get worse

ATLANTA - Data from the Georgia Department of Education shows school districts are failing to retain more and more teachers each year.  

And experts are warning this could lead to a real problem in your child’s school.  

Angelica Alexander-Outley taught dance to kids for 11 years in several schools around metro Atlanta.  

"I started at South Cobb High School. Then I was with Fulton County Schools at Sandtown Middle School. And the last part of my career I was with APS, South Atlanta High School. So for the last four years of my teaching career, I was there," Alexander-Outley said.  

She says once after schools went to remote learning for the pandemic, things got a lot harder.  

"Teaching online was very difficult. Having to change my living room into a dance studio and I had two kids at home and they had to learn online," she said.  

But even after students returned to campuses, she says things continued to pile up.  

"You're getting evaluated, so make sure everything's up on the board, make sure everything's in the lesson plan, make sure you're in these professional developments. And you have duty, make sure you're out in the hallway checking bags as students are coming in and things like that. It just became way, way, way too much," Alexander-Outley said.  

She got burned out.  

"As much as I love my students and as much as I love my job, I just couldn't do it anymore," she said.  

She left teaching for good in 2022. 

Teacher burnout is something Dr. Gary Bingham, interim Department Chair of Georgia State University’s Department of Early Child and Elementary Education, says is becoming all too common for Georgia teachers.  

"There is a general sense of teacher burnout that is happening in our discipline. Teachers have also not been well-supported professionally or I would also say economically over the last few years," Bingham said.  

Data from the Georgia Department of education shows that statewide teacher retention has dropped for the last two years. 

We looked at data on several major school districts in the metro area, including Fulton, Cobb, DeKalb, Gwinnett and Atlanta Public Schools.  

State data shows that teacher retention has dropped in all these districts in the Atlanta Metro area for the last two years as well.   

"I think we're already in a severe teaching shortage and I think t's going to get worse," said Laura May, Associate Dean of the College of Education and Human Development at Georgia State University.  

 She says the fact is there’s simply not enough new teachers coming through the pipeline to replace the ones that are leaving now. 

"There's a pretty restricted pipeline. Colleges of Education and other teacher preparation programs do not have a lot of people interested in starting them… so we need even more teachers and we're losing more and we're producing fewer," May said.  

Alexander-Outley found a way to continue teaching by starting her own dance education company called ‘Life is an 8 Count.’ 

She says they focus on improving mental health through dance.  

She hopes school districts will listen to teachers more, so that experienced teachers like her don’t keep leaving.  

 "I think just caring a little more and asking and giving an opportunity for teachers to say, ‘hey, I'm not doing well and not take it out on teachers with their paid time off and give them a mental break," Alexander-Outley said.  

We reached out to all the districts whose data we looked at and asked them how they’re working to keep experienced teachers from leaving.  

Here’s how they responded.  

Cobb County Schools gave us this statement: "With approximately 19,000 team members, we retained 99% of our staff, including our teachers. Thanks to our Superintendent and Board's commitment to our Team, we currently have approximately 10 open teaching positions. We spend approximately 94% of our budget on our Team, are home to the first program in the state to pay teachers for their advanced degrees (Georgia’s BEST), and have been named among the best places to work for multiple years."  

The 99% retention they claim contradicts GDOE data.  

Fulton County Schools gave us this statement: "The number one priority in Fulton County Schools is to ensure that we have talented teachers in front of every student. As part of our efforts to retain qualified teachers we continue to provide competitive compensation through salary increases and retention incentives, offer professional development opportunities, create a supportive working environment, implement mentorship programs, and listen to teachers' feedback to address their concerns. Interested applicants can visit: https://www.fultonschools.org/Domain/271." 

DeKalb County Schools gave us information on pay incentives for experienced teachers, including a $2,000 "retention incentive."  

They also said, "We have found that educator pipelines are not producing the necessary quantity of high-quality, highly qualified staff needed to support schools. To date, the District has hired more than 700 certified educators, yet still needs 400 to be fully staffed to start the new year. As a result, the District will implement an "all-hands-on-deck" approach to start the school year and ensure that every student has access to quality instruction." 

Atlanta Public Schools told us they were going to send us "some facts and a statement," but we haven’t received them yet.  

We didn’t hear back from Gwinnett County Schools Friday.