“I thought about quitting everyday my first year,” Bill Pratt, longtime Berkeley High School teacher, said. Similar to many teachers across the nation, Pratt’s struggles included lack of financial compensation, burnout, and social underappreciation. Pratt has taught at BHS for 31 years, is the co-founder of the Communication Arts and Sciences small school, and was formerly the district coordinator for the Beginning Teacher and Support Program, now the Berkeley Schools Excellence Program (BSEP).
According to a survey conducted from 2020 to 2024 by Statistica, in August of 2024, roughly 79,000 teachers in the U. S. quit their jobs. This trend is reflected nationally, according to a study conducted by Richard Ingersoll of the University of Pennsylvania’s Graduate School of Education, 44 percent of all teachers nationwide quit within their first five years of teaching.
According to educators of BHS, these alarming levels of teacher turnover are present in the United States for a multitude of reasons.
Pratt explained that lack of financial compensation for the amount of skill and time required for educational occupations is a substantial contributing factor. “Fundamentally, teachers have to be paid more … most of us have masters degrees, and many of us have training beyond that, and so for people with an equivalent level of education and training, the salaries generally for teachers are low,” Pratt said.
According to Samantha Borg, who’s been teaching for 25 years, 19 years of which were at BHS, the drastic contrast between teacher pay in other countries and the United States also plays a role in the stark teacher retention rate here. “A lot of people are fleeing the profession, because there’s just so much output and then you give so much of yourself, of your time, of just everything, and then ... to not be compensated financially in a way that, in any other profession, it would be market rate. In other countries, teachers are some of the top paid professions, but again, here in the United States, it’s not that way,” Borg said.
Salaries shared with The Jacket by the BUSD administration reflected financial compensation below the state average. According to the data, a mid-range teacher salary in BUSD is $86,582 for teachers with a master's and a bachelor's degree, though the highest teacher pay is $119,053. The California state average, however, is $95,160 – the best in the nation, according to the National Education Association. A beginning teacher salary for those with preliminary or clear credentials is $68,881 at BUSD. According to Zillow, the median monthly cost of rent for all property types in Berkeley is $2,699, in comparison to the national median of $2,000. For new teachers, an already difficult to navigate BUSD only becomes more difficult when the financial burden of housing and basic amenities becomes unmanageable.
During a BUSD school board meeting on Monday, Oct. 7, 2024, educators spoke up to advocate for higher pay. Azhia Long, a third grade teacher at Rosa Parks Elementary School explained that she wishes to continue working in the district, but may not be able to if salaries are not raised. “Half of my monthly salary is allocated to rent ... The time is now, treat us with dignity and offer compensation that is sustainable to my colleagues and me. I want to stay in this district but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to do so,” Long said at the meeting.
Viridiana Castro Silva, a fellow teacher of Long’s at Rosa Parks Elementary School, agreed. Castro Silva explained during the meeting that she is unable to live within the district she serves due to low pay, which she finds to be unacceptable. She resonated with Long’s perspective, advocating for an increased compensation offer for teachers.
Borg believes the reason teachers may leave the occupation within five years of beginning their careers at BHS has to do with the period of life the person is in. She explained that starting out is particularly difficult, especially at BHS due to the sheer size of the school and thus the difficulties of navigating all aspects of the profession.
“It's not the easiest school to start your career in because there's so much going on and so many different aspects of the job to learn. It's a school with a lot of resources but you kind of have to learn how to access those resources, and that takes time,” Borg said.
Joseph Marchant, an English teacher at BHS, has endured similar difficulties in the two years he's been a teacher. He feels that understanding the big picture is crucial, but difficult in frustrating moments. “I think that it is a challenge working with young people, and there are times in the classroom where you feel overwhelmed and outnumbered and exhausted, and it's really tough to see the positive side of the work that you're doing in (that) moment,” Marchant said.
Borg and Pratt also believe that there are many societal factors that contribute to a turnover disparity between teaching and other careers. For example, Pratt made a comparison between teaching and the medical field; how the two require a similar level of commitment and work but teaching pays far less and does not have the same level of prestige in society. “A young doctor ... they’re miserable, but they know that the long term trajectory of their career is one that is going to involve solid and potentially excellent financial compensation ... and that’s just not true in the same way for teachers,” Pratt said.
In addition to the occupation requiring many of the same prerequisites and pedigrees that other much higher paying jobs have, according to Pratt, being a teacher is very mentally taxing. “Teaching is a really challenging job that takes a long time to learn how to do well,” Pratt said.
Pratt explained that there are also many problems deeply ingrained in society regarding how teachers are treated and viewed by the public, such as lack of recognition and social respectability. “Fundamentally, there’s not enough recognition of just how complex and challenging the job of being an effective teacher is,” Pratt said.
Pratt added that the lack of external validation teachers receive — despite the immense effort and talent teaching requires — deters new educators from pursuing their careers in education.
Additionally, according to Borg, although there are many factors involved, she believes the amount of work required to be a successful teacher is the largest contributor to the astoundingly high numbers of teachers leaving the profession. “Teaching is ... very demanding, particularly of one’s energy, both physically and emotionally. So I think burnout is probably the number one reason why people decide to stop teaching, along with the pay,” Borg said.
Based on the information gathered from Pratt and Borg, disregarding any issues involved in teaching itself, the most challenging aspect is getting past the first few years of teaching. “It’s deeply rewarding work, it’s fun, and that’s part of what’s kept me in it for as long ... (but) for teachers in their first couple of years, the burdens and the challenges kind of outweigh those rewards,” Pratt said.
According to Borg, the future does not have a negative trajectory, but in order to solve the issue of high rates of teacher turnovers, much change needs to occur in the education system. “I am hopeful that it can improve, but I think in order for it to improve, there's going to have to be a massive nationwide campaign to change how education is done in this country, but also how it is delivered,” Borg said.
Marchant believes that to address this issue teachers simply must receive more help and support during the beginning of their careers — as well as in general — and must be paid more. “I think there's a lot of things that schools can do to make their teachers feel more supported and more seen, in addition to, well, just paying them more, to be honest,” Marchant said.
Currently, BUSD is addressing issues with teacher retention and recruitment with a local parcel tax measure called the Berkeley Schools Excellence Program (BSEP). According to the website, one focus of BSEP is to recruit qualified teachers and keep them in the profession. The program intends to do this by constructing more viable pathways for all staff involved in education. According to the BSEP website, the fund has made a significant impact on new teacher enrollment, with a 65 percent increase since 2019.
According to Pratt, the future is not yet determined; it is highly contingent upon the way we address the issue.
“I'm not holding out for dramatic change ... But I'm not pessimistic ... I think part of it going forward is also that we're in the middle of these really fundamental shifts in our economy and in the world that high school graduates are going out into, and that also requires some rethinking of how we recruit teachers to do that work,” Pratt said.