2 Ways to Begin Fixing the Environment of Schools

Are our educators thriving or merely surviving?

In our last post, we used the analogy of the canary in the coal mine to help explain some of the issues we see with teacher attrition and retention. Just like the miners who used to take the canary into the coal mines to check the quality of the air, it seems like we continue taking our educators into environments that are not healthy for them. Yet, we continually focus on the canary, or educator in this case, as the problem. We talk to them about more self-care when the environment that is causing the problem is unhealthy at best and toxic at worst.

We have this view in the US that stress and burnout work like a badge of honor. “She's not doing enough—she's not burnt out yet,” seems to be the mindset of many in education. But don't we want something better, healthier, and sustaining for the people who educate our children?

Don't we want them to thrive and not merely survive?

Thriving

Thriving at work, whether in education or any other profession, is defined simply as a psychological state where people feel a sense of vitality and a sense of learning and growth.

Measures of thriving at work have been shown to predict job satisfaction, subjective health, and burnout above traditional concepts like work engagement (Goh et al., 2022).

Two core ideas support the nature of thriving at work, regardless of industry, and could be used as fundamental guides for fixing the environments in schools. First, most employees work in teams or units, and if these structures support trust, respect, and decision-making abilities, people will thrive. Second, thriving spirals develop when individuals can self-determine tasks, feel free to explore ways to accomplish those tasks, and relate to others. These self-determined actions help individuals generate their own knowledge, meaning, and relational resources. These resources, in turn, drive further positive work behaviors, thus creating a recurring loop of positive behaviors.

If these fundamentals are the air in the coal mine, how might we better develop these in schools?

Fixing the Environment First

While getting rid of most federal and state mandates is not in the purview of educators, leaders must focus on the environment in which teachers work. To supply fresh air to our educators, we need to rethink and recreate the entire environment of schools based on these two fundamental ideas.

At the team level, we must first develop and coach teams to develop ongoing trust and relational abilities, not looking to outside leaders to solve their problems. External accountability cannot work until internal accountability of teams becomes part of the environment of a school. Teams are the primary structure by which much of the improvement work in schools gets done, but they often succumb to the traditions of the schoolhouse and the inherent hierarchy. More effort needs to be put into the coaching of teams. When thriving individuals work together, they begin to form shared beliefs and norms about positive behaviors that can become the team's norms. This fundamental also assumes the need for more time to work as teams in the daily schedule of schools.

Additionally, teams need to be trusted to make good decisions based on the needs of their students. While the PLC movement has attempted to do this, this structure needs to move way beyond the assumption of more testing toward more professional dialogue around helping students versus fulfilling mandates. This movement will require new mindsets and tradeoffs between leaders and their teachers, but empowerment toward trust can help reestablish the education profession. Better teams is one form of oxygen to help educators succeed.

Second, our teachers need more autonomy and relational support from their colleagues and leaders than ever before based on localized issues and needs. This autonomy, if focused correctly, and relational support will allow teachers to focus on those tasks that most matter to them, generate solutions that work for them, and develop supportive relationships with other teachers. We know from research on self-determination that people must feel they can be autonomous in making their own choices as a professional but also possess the need to feel related to others in the workplace. Beyond the congenial and even collegial, collective efficacy can be developed when educators feel the need to support others and feel supported by others in service of their students.

In sum, the fundamentals of developing better teams and developing autonomy and relational support together can provide the oxygen to make the school environment safer for our educators' mental and physical well-being. Just as mines became safer over the years, starting with the canary as the oxygen meter, we now have the science to make our school environments safer, which can lead to thriving for our educators through better understanding the fundamemntals of healthy workplaces. Over time we hope to bring this science forward so that educators can better balance the heavy demands of teaching with the sources of oxygen necessary for their thriving.