Pre-doctoral program warm-up: A look at high school teacher turnover in Hanover County, Virginia
This past summer in conjunction with a local public education advocacy group, Friends of Hanover Schools, that I was a part of, I engaged in a little pre-doctoral program warm-up.
At a Hanover County School Board forum in the spring, I had expressed concern about high school teacher turnover and was told more or less that my concerns were unfounded. Other members of the FOHS leadership team had also been long concerned about high school teacher turnover, so after they and I spent some time gathering information from the division, I compiled a report of my findings. Other members of the leadership team gave feedback and provided edits for the final version. I may do something with this later or I may decide it is too J-V :)
Here is a summary with links to the documents I used:
In the 2013-2014 school year, Hanover County Public Schools increased high school teachers’ workload and they went from teaching five of seven classes a day to teaching six of eight. After teachers protested the policy, saying it would affect the quality of instruction and feedback they’d be able to give students, Friends of Hanover Schools began to hear reports of low morale, of higher than average teacher resignations and retirements, and of increasing numbers of teachers seeking positions elsewhere. I took a closer look at the data regarding teacher turnover in Hanover and compiled a report of my findings which was distributed to school division leadership.
According to budget and retirements and resignations data provided by Hanover County Public Schools, the combined turnover rates for all four of the comprehensive high schools are:
Other than the schedule re-alignment, several factors may have influenced teacher turnover in Hanover County such All Things Education: Pre-doctoral program warm-up: A look at high school teacher turnover in Hanover County, Virginia:
At a Hanover County School Board forum in the spring, I had expressed concern about high school teacher turnover and was told more or less that my concerns were unfounded. Other members of the FOHS leadership team had also been long concerned about high school teacher turnover, so after they and I spent some time gathering information from the division, I compiled a report of my findings. Other members of the leadership team gave feedback and provided edits for the final version. I may do something with this later or I may decide it is too J-V :)
Here is a summary with links to the documents I used:
In the 2013-2014 school year, Hanover County Public Schools increased high school teachers’ workload and they went from teaching five of seven classes a day to teaching six of eight. After teachers protested the policy, saying it would affect the quality of instruction and feedback they’d be able to give students, Friends of Hanover Schools began to hear reports of low morale, of higher than average teacher resignations and retirements, and of increasing numbers of teachers seeking positions elsewhere. I took a closer look at the data regarding teacher turnover in Hanover and compiled a report of my findings which was distributed to school division leadership.
According to budget and retirements and resignations data provided by Hanover County Public Schools, the combined turnover rates for all four of the comprehensive high schools are:
| School year | Resign | Retire | Total | Total teachers | Percentage turnover |
| 2004-2005 | 30 | 6 | 36 | 502.191 | 7.17% |
| 2005-2006 | 56 | 5 | 61 | 480.73 | 12.69% |
| 2006-2007 | 53 | 7 | 60 | 492.491 | 12.18% |
| 2007-2008 | 55 | 14 | 69 | 500.491 | 13.79% |
| 2008-2009 | 27 | 4 | 31 | 496.391 | 6.25% |
| 2009-2010 | 33 | 10 | 43 | 487.191 | 8.83% |
| 2010-2011 | 38 | 11 | 49 | 474.191 | 10.33% |
| 2011-2012 | 31 | 7 | 38 | 465.991 | 8.15% |
| 2012-2013 | 42 | 11 | 53 | 452.991 | 11.70% |
| 2013-2014* | 35 | 5 | 40 | 440.991 | 9.07% |
| 10 year average | 400 | 80 | 480 | 4795.649 | 10.01% |
*The data for 2013-2014 is as of August 6, 2014.