"I love my students—but I can’t keep doing this.”
These words were shared by one of my star teachers, just before submitting her resignation. She was passionate, effective, and beloved by students. As her principal at the time, I knew her departure wasn’t about her ability; it was about her well-being.
Unfortunately, her story isn’t unique. For decades, educators have romanticized the teaching profession as a “calling.” While there is no doubt that many educators enter the field with deep purpose, purpose alone is not a retention strategy. The belief that commitment should override capacity is unsustainable. If we want to retain teachers, especially amid ongoing national shortages, we must urgently rethink how we support them.
Why the “Calling” Narrative Harms Teachers
The “calling” narrative—which casts teaching as a moral vocation rooted in self-sacrifice—can unintentionally normalize unhealthy expectations. It implies that passion should substitute for fair pay, manageable workloads, or work-life boundaries. While this mindset may be well-intentioned, it has contributed to a culture where burnout becomes a badge of honor. This narrative is especially harmful because it romanticizes struggle and frames exhaustion as evidence of excellence. Teachers who stay late, skip lunch, and forgo personal time are often praised as “dedicated,” while those who set boundaries or speak up about burnout risk being labeled as needy or disengaged.
By framing teaching as a mission that requires personal sacrifice, we risk devaluing the profession’s technical and emotional demands. Teaching is complex, high-stakes work that requires sustained cognitive energy, emotional labor, and expertise. However, the calling narrative oversimplifies that reality, portraying teaching as a moral endeavor rather than a profession requiring ongoing support, development, and care. The result is a profession filled with deeply committed individuals who are quietly—and too often, prematurely—leaving.
What the Data Says About Teacher Retention
Studies consistently show that teachers do not leave the profession because they lack purpose but because they lack the resources, support, and working conditions needed to sustain that purpose. Carver-Thomas and Darling-Hammond (2017) identified administrative support, competitive compensation, high-quality preparation, and leadership as critical factors in teacher retention. More recent data reinforce and expand these findings.
According to a 2024 Gallup poll, 44 percent of U.S. teachers report feeling burned out often or always, up from 36 percent in 2020. This chronic stress affects teachers’ ability to remain in the profession and impacts their instructional effectiveness (Gallup, 2024). In fact, 48 percent of K–12 educators reported that their declining mental health negatively affected their teaching (Bader, 2024).
Administrative support continues to be a significant predictor of teacher retention. A study from the University of Kansas found that teachers were far more likely to stay when they received consistent backing from school leadership, more so than from higher pay alone (Sun, 2020). Work-life balance has also emerged as a top factor in retention decisions. A 2024 national survey found that 43 percent of teachers considering leaving the profession would be willing to stay if schools implemented more balanced and flexible schedules (Lehtinen-Vela, 2024). Findings like these suggest school districts must see retention not as an issue of recruitment or pay alone but as a cultural and wellness issue rooted in daily working conditions.
What Supporting Teachers Really Means
Educators stay when they are supported, valued, and allowed to thrive as whole people. While purpose may bring them in, it’s meaningful, structural support that helps them stay. However, “support” can be a vague and subjective term. What feels supportive to one teacher might feel like performance to another. For some, it’s having autonomy in the classroom. For others, it’s knowing their mental health is taken seriously. That’s why effective support must be multidimensional, embedded in daily systems, responsive to individual needs, and not just offered as one-size-fits-all. Keeping teachers rooted instead of running requires systemic supports like:
- Workload boundaries. Teachers must have reasonable planning loads, protected prep time, and limits on non-instructional duties (Mielke, 2023).
- Autonomy and trust. Teachers who feel trusted to make instructional decisions report higher job satisfaction (Worth & Van den Brande, 2020).
- Wellness systems. Teachers need access to mental health resources, peer support, and a culture that normalizes self-care practices (Regional Educational Laboratory Northeast & Islands, 2024).
- Inclusive culture. Teachers must feel a sense of belonging, psychological safety, and recognition (Zepeda et al., 2024).
Time is a teacher’s most limited and valuable resource. When leaders protect it, they send a clear message: Your professional capacity matters more than your personal availability.
The Power of Small Shifts
These kinds of system-level supports don’t always require major overhauls or expensive initiatives. I have seen firsthand the power of small shifts from leaders in my district—shifts that happen when school leaders create cultures that make teachers feel seen, trusted, and supported.
Recently, one of our principals began replacing punitive attendance conversations with proactive wellness check-ins. Instead of waiting until teacher absences became a disciplinary concern, she began holding brief, supportive check-ins that started with a simple question: “How are you doing, and how can I help?” The shift in tone was intentional. It allowed her to provide early intervention and wraparound supports such as the Employee Wellness Program or ADA reasonable accommodations. Sometimes those conversations just became a safe space for teachers to share their voice. Over time, teachers became more open about stressors they were facing, whether related to caregiving, burnout, or mental health. They were more likely to seek support before reaching a breaking point. What had once been a source of tension became a touchpoint for connection.
Another principal took a fresh look at building-level responsibilities through a more thoughtful lens. Instead of relying on a traditional duty rotation—or repeatedly turning to the same dependable staff—she began accounting for when teachers naturally faced higher or lower demands. State-tested teachers were protected during testing windows; the chorus teacher’s supervision load lightened during performance season. She even broke some responsibilities into shorter, targeted assignments. For example, one veteran teacher took on an August-only leadership role, orienting new staff to gradebooks, lesson planning software, and student discipline systems. In exchange, she carried no additional duties that month. The principal’s approach didn’t eliminate the work—it redistributed it with intentionality. Every staff member contributed, but in ways that acknowledged their specific pressures and strengths. Teachers voiced their appreciation for the intentional and thoughtful lens the principal took to a shared workload.
Across the education landscape, especially in the aftermath of the pandemic, conversations around burnout, mental health, and sustainable work have become far more mainstream. In response, I’ve seen principals engage directly with what it means for their staff to feel supported. To reinforce this shift, our HR team began offering “mini learning sessions” specifically focused on what school leaders needed to know about having difficult conversations, reasonable accommodations, and FMLA. With renewed confidence, principals started embedding systematic support into their daily practices. Now, some principals proactively inform staff about their rights to request ADA accommodations, helping to normalize conversations that once felt off limits. Others are making employee assistance programs more visible by promoting access to free counseling services during staff meetings or in weekly newsletters. These consistent reminders go a long way in making mental health support feel like a routine and expected part of how we care for staff.
On the talent side, HR liaisons partnered with principals to identify their most effective teachers—the ones whose impact is so significant that retaining them is critical to the school’s success. Once identified, principals personally connected with these teachers through targeted “stay conversations,” which focused on gathering candid feedback, exploring future leadership opportunities, and giving these teachers a meaningful voice in shaping their school’s direction. By intentionally investing in their growth, principals began cultivating the next generation of teacher leaders and building school cultures where top talent felt seen, valued, and eager to stay.
Purpose—With Protections
Teaching is still a noble profession, but it must also become a sustainable one. Educators should not have to burn out to prove they care. By pairing purpose with systems that support and empower teachers, we can create a profession that educators enter with passion and remain in with pride. The myth of the calling might have gotten us here, but it’s time for a new narrative that honors the heart of teaching without sacrificing the people who do it.
Author’s note: The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Knox County Schools.
Action Steps for School Leaders
To move beyond the myth of the calling and toward sustainable retention, leaders must take small but intentional steps to subtly shift school culture and systems in ways that honor both the purpose behind the work and the people who carry it out. These are not one-time gestures but rather practices that must be embedded, monitored, and modeled consistently.
Audit your culture. What behaviors are praised? Who gets recognized, and for what? A culture that only celebrates self-sacrifice and martyrdom unintentionally discourages sustainability. Take a close look at your informal norms, recognition systems, and language around “dedication.”
Protect time. Safeguard planning periods and discourage after-hours communication. Time is a teacher’s most limited and valuable resource. When leaders protect it, they send a clear message: Your professional capacity matters more than your personal availability.
Normalize mental health. Talk about it in staff meetings, include it in climate surveys, and ensure that resources are easy to access and free of stigma. Make mental health part of your operational priorities, not just a “wellness week” in an attempt to boost morale.
Redefine commitment. Value sustainability over sacrifice. Teachers shouldn’t have to choose between excellence and well-being. When leaders model balance, respect boundaries, and create space for teachers to show up as whole people, retention becomes a natural outcome, not a constant scramble.
