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Description
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When Gabe Soumakian joined Burbank Unified School District (CA) two years ago as assistant superintendent for the human resources department, collecting data about teacher turnover was not a high priority. Shortly after his arrival, contract negotiations opened, and representatives of the local teachers association cited high attrition rates as a rationale for several expensive bargaining points. Soumakian began researching the figures provided by the teachers association, and he found that the district did not have the data to either verify or refute statements about teacher turnover in the district.
Today, officials in BUSD, on the outskirts of Los Angeles, are getting a handle on which teachers are leaving the district and why, all thanks to a FileMaker Pro database Soumakian developed and is now using for data collection, aggregation, and analysis. "It was difficult at first," he says, "but I wanted to be able to discuss the real reasons behind teacher turnover in this district and find cost-effective solutions based on our needs."
Soumakian's efforts, while not enough to arrest teacher turnover, at least are an attempt at understanding its sources. It's a first step in the difficult work of reversing the astonishing rate at which new teachers are quitting the profession. Expert estimates anticipate that nearly half of this year's new hires will leave teaching within the next three years. Half
In addition to the direct, negative impact that teacher flight has on student achievement, districts are waking up to the reality that turnover on this scale is costing them thousands, even tens of thousands, of dollars for every teacher that must be replaced. In districts where the annual rate of teacher turnover surpasses the average for student dropouts (roughly 30 percent nationally), it doesn't require much financial acumen to realize that the cost of low teacher retention quickly eats up a hefty chunk of the budget.
What can be done to stem this drain on already limited resources, and where can technology help? Collecting, analyzing, and reporting the data, as Soumakian is doing for Burbank USD, are just initial moves leading to an even more important question: How will this information be used to reduce teacher turnover and the associated costs?
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