Lessons in not leaving: rethink how we support teachers

One in four newly qualified teachers leave the profession within three years

- BANELE LUKHELE

THE writing’s not just on the wall but in the resignation letters, the absenteeism, and the exhausted faces in classrooms up and down the country. South Africa’s education crisis continues to simmer with our teachers either burnt out, checking out, or, in many cases, walking out altogether.

Recent findings from Stellenbosch University’s Research on Socio-Economic Policy Unit (ReSEP) confirm what many of us have long suspected. One in four newly qualified teachers leave the profession within three years, and nearly half of all teachers are considering leaving in the next decade. Those who leave do so not because they lack commitment or capability but because they’re drowning in a system that offers too little support, too late.

We can't keep expecting teachers to be miracle workers in under-resourced environments and then blame them when those very miracles don’t materialise.

At the Jakes Gerwel Fellowship, we work with Newly Qualified Teachers (NQTs) every day, providing one-on-one coaching, peer learning, and mental health support to teachers in quintile 1-3 schools, the very environments where the need is greatest and the burdens are heaviest.

Our internal data reveals a stark contrast to the national attrition rate, with 80% of our NQTs having committed to staying in the classroom for at least three to five more years. That's not a coincidence but the results of targeted, evidence-based and wraparound support.