Job satisfaction of teachers’ wanes: TALIS

The teaching profession is still valued in the society. Teachers experience that schools in Finland have a good community spirit. However, teachers are less satisfied with their working environment than before, reports the OECD TALIS ((Teaching and Learning International Survey).

The survey, which included 48 countries, also said that teachers no longer enjoy work as much as they used to, an education ministry press release quoted the survey as reporting.

The changing demands, administrative work, and having to adjust teaching to the needs of children and young people in need of special support are the main stress factors for teachers.

The results of the national part of TALIS 2018 (Teaching and Learning International Survey) were published in two parts. These are the results of the second part of the study.

The results give an idea of the working conditions of teachers and school leaders and how they experience the teaching environment of their own school.

About 2,850 secondary school teachers and 150 school leaders participated in the study in Finland, and internationally, a total of around 160,000 secondary school teachers and 9,400 school leaders took part in it.

The data were collected in spring 2018. Each participating country may use the results in developing its own education policy.

“The TALIS survey gives information on the strengths and challenges of the Finnish education system. This is important and helps us steer work in the right direction to develop our educational system using research-based data,” said Minister of Science and Culture Annika Saarikko.

Schools encourage working collaboratively than before. Collaborative teamwork in teaching and taking part in professional cooperative learning have become more common among teachers over the past five years. Teachers trust each other and schools encourage everyone to show initiative. Sharing responsibility is an integral part of schools.

However, the findings of the survey show that there is still much to be done to improve the sense of community in Finland. For example, teachers in Sweden and Norway engage in different forms of collaborative efforts with other teachers more actively than teachers do in Finland. Teachers in Finland also feel that they receive on average much less feedback on their work, compared with other reference countries in the survey.

More than 90% teachers in Finland said the advantages of their job outweigh the disadvantages. Teachers’ satisfaction with their work environment and profession is marginally diminishing. Job satisfaction has dropped by three percentage points over the past five years. Teachers are less likely than before to recommend their own school as a good place to work. In addition, the share of teachers who said they would choose the profession of teaching again has slightly decreased.

“It is important to look after the wellbeing of both teachers and students. Wellbeing affects the quality of teaching and studying. When teachers are satisfied with their work, we can offer high-quality and equitable education at schools,” said Education Minister Li Andersson.

“The survey provides decision-makers, teachers and principals with extensive international comparative information on schools as an operating environment and the opportunity to develop teaching, education evaluation and education policy,” said Matti Taajamo, a project manager at the Finnish Institute for Educational Research based at the University of Jyväskylä.