Stress and Burnout

Educators have been struggling with these factors for a long time.

How are you feeling today?

This might be a question you would ask a student who is struggling. However, given the high teacher burnout rate, the challenges of 2020, and the fact that many educators are just trying to do the best they can, I’ll ask again—how are you feeling today? Take a deep breath and really dig in. Maybe you are feeling overwhelmed, frustrated, scared, curious, or hopeful. However you are feeling is OK.

Teacher burnout has been a problem for a long time. In their book, Burnout: The Secret to Unlocking the Stress Cycle, authors Emily and Amelia Nagoski cite that 20–30 percent of teachers have moderate to high levels of burnout. Not just the socially distanced, masked, virtual teaching kind of burnout many of us are experiencing during the COVID-19 pandemic, but burnout from a system that hasn’t been working for many students and educators for a while.

The Nagoskis write that burnout is defined by three components: emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and decreased sense of accomplishment. Does that sound like something you have experienced? Emotional exhaustion happens when we care too much for too long. Depersonalization refers to not having enough empathy and caring for others. Finally, a decreased sense of accomplishment leads to feeling like nothing you do matters. That can be a lot for a teacher, and burnout is not uncommon.

Not just the socially distanced, masked, virtual teaching kind of burnout many of us are experiencing during the COVID-19 pandemic, but burnout from a system that hasn’t been working for many students and educators for a while.

A 2018 study by researchers from the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence and the Otto Beisheim School of Management stated that 85 percent of teachers said that work–life imbalance was affecting their ability to teach (Moeller, Ivcevic, White, Menges, & Brackett, 2018, as cited in Cipriano & Brackett, 2020).

Educators have been struggling with stress and burnout for a long time. From high-pressure state testing to trying to keep up with ever-changing educational requirements, burnout and stress are real.

There is good news to all of this: There are things that can help. Current research in the fields of positive psychology, neuroscience, mindset, and human learning potential have given us great insights into how we can create more connection in our schools, classrooms, and lives. This paper breaks down the latest research about emotional well-being and describes activities—many of which are improv comedy exercises—that can help you feel more connected today.

I am happy with my work–life balance.

Strongly Agree
Agree
Neutral
Disagree
Strongly Disagree

85 percent of teachers said that work–life imbalance was affecting their ability to teach.

Why am I writing this professional paper? Because I changed my professional and personal trajectory using the concepts and activities that will be laid out in this paper. Once upon a time, I was the burnt-out classroom teacher. I know what it’s like to enter a classroom feeling overwhelmed and hopeless, and now my job is to help teachers avoid burnout and feel more connected. What you focus on is what you see. I chose to focus on positivity, changing my mindset, and taking care of myself as a human, and my students, friends, and family were better off for it. In fact, many educators have fundamentally changed by implementing practices that you will read about in this paper. I’ll share my story and the stories of others to help you know you are not alone in what you are feeling and to show how the mindsets I describe have had positive impact on educators’ lives.

It starts with you, and it starts with a belief that things can get better. Not only can they get better, but we can take the stress and uncertainty we are feeling right now and make meaning from them. Now is the time to start to reinvent the way we take on the work of education so we can create stronger, more connected learning experiences for educators and students. If I was able to turn things around, you can, too! Each day is a new day, so whenever you are reading this, it’s time to start.

It starts with you, and it starts with a belief
that things can get better. Not only can they
get better, but we can take the stress and uncertainty we are feeling right now and make meaning from them.