Earlier in the year a question from Michael Gove, MP in the House of Commons revealed that as of March 2008 there were 404,600 qualified teachers not recorded as being in service. The Shadow Secretary of State for Children, Schools and Families described the situation as a “tragic waste of talent that is costing the taxpayers millions of pounds every year”; blaming this apparent professional diaspora on “red tape” and the reduction of powers to “keep order in the classroom”.

On the other side of the Commons, Vernon Coaker, MP, Secretary of State for Schools and Learners, gave qualification to the figure cited. Some of this number would be working in the independent sector, he explained; some in higher education; others in more diverse educative positions not recorded in the total. Some would be working outside England and Wales, he said, although the Conservative Party later cited a survey from online recruitment service Eteach in which a third of teacher respondents said they were actively seeking work abroad – 32 per cent of whom cited “better working conditions” as their motivation – as further evidence that teachers are being driven from English and Welsh classrooms.

There are of course many other reasons why such a seemingly high number of teachers may be working outside of the classroom. At Teacher Support Network, we have always welcomed the recruitment of teachers from a variety of backgrounds; whether fulfilling urgent ambitions to influence young people’s lives and join the profession immediately after graduation or coming to the classroom later in life; bringing invaluable experiences from other areas of society. There are few ‘jobs for life’ anymore, and whilst we may be rightly concerned about the reduced job security that this may bring to society in general, there are many benefits to the transfer of the skills and experiences of employees between sectors. Teachers may benefit from a break from the classroom, both in terms of their personal development, the experiences of schools that they will take to other organisations and the knowledge they will bring back to the classroom when they return.

On top of this, whilst often hearing firsthand that teaching can be the most wonderfully rewarding of vocations that provides the opportunity to make a huge contribution to the lives of children, we do not believe that teaching is for everybody; nor should qualified teachers remain in the profession throughout their lives through sheer obligation. Whilst assisting a child achieve his ambitions of attending university, become a paramedic develop a passion for literature or begin to grasp the most challenging of physics may be supremely gratifying, even in the best-run schools, teaching can be tremendously challenging. In many ways, teachers stand right on the front line of the fight to improve young people’s lives. Ensuring the constant development of knowledge in the face of difficulties – some avoidable, some not, some dramatic, some persistent and gnawing – in pupils’ lives can be a genuine labour of love.

Nevertheless a teaching workforce that is compatible with the development of increased career changing should not mask the genuine disheartenment of many teachers with the profession that they love. Many of the challenges facing schools may be inevitable, but this does not mean that all of the difficulties that teachers face in their jobs are inescapable, too. Nor is it merely a question of decreasing bureaucracy and improving discipline in schools that could redress teacher dissatisfaction. Excessive workload, the rapid pace of change in schools, difficulties with management, bullying in the staffroom and problems with pupils’ parents all contribute to the massive extent of emotional health problems amongst teachers and their ability to teach at their best.

Too many schools have been unable to develop meaningful policies to address these problems – or the stress, anxiety and depression that this lack induces amongst their staff. And schools need the support of both local and central government in producing and implementing these kind of policies. In order to ensure that the wealth of talent present in classrooms across the country choices to remain in the profession unfettered by genuine concerns about their wellbeing, the scale of common mental health problems amongst teachers – and the causes of these concerns – must be addressed. In addition, in order to get the most out of our existing teaching workforce, solutions to problems with the performance of individual teachers must not be viewed purely as weaning out the weak or imposing undue scrutiny, unreasonable performance criteria and unwarranted pressure, but understood in the context of how to prevent the manifold difficulties of teaching reducing teachers abilities to do the job they love.