Problem Solving through Research: Our Own Teachers Don't Recommend Working at Our School!

By Dr. Harry Bloom, Founder and President, Benchmarking for Good, Inc.

The Case for Action

Benchmarking for Good research and analysis of survey results with nearly 1500 Jewish day school faculty reveals that only 56% of teachers at Jewish day schools are very likely to recommend working at their school to prospective hires, despite reporting personal job satisfaction levels of 4.3/5.0. This paradox indicates the following thinking process on the part of a very significant percentage of Jewish day school teachers:" I am accepting of the challenges related to working at our school but am reluctant to recommend it to others." Clearly this is a staff recruitment challenge that needs resolution if day schools are to recruit the next generation of teachers in the face of an aging current teacher population and the likelihood of significant retirements in the coming years.

Top 3 Causes of Teachers' Reluctance to Recommend Their School to Others are:

(1) Perceived unrealistic workload expectations on the part of supervisors

(2) Dissatisfaction with the work environment

(3) Perceived barriers to open communication

Action Planning for Addressing the Problem

Obviously, every school's personnel and environment is unique. However, here are some common sense suggested actions that school administrators can take to make current teachers into more enthusiastic ambassadors to potential teachers. Their appropriateness for your school can be explored through Faculty Climate Surveys coupled with diagnostic qualitative research.

Near-Term Actions

1. Conduct a Workload Audit

Driver: Perception that their supervisor has unrealistic workload expectations

• Conduct anonymous flash survey asking teachers to list their top 3 unrealistic expectations

• Review actual vs. expected working hours through time logs

• Identify and immediately eliminate non-essential administrative tasks

• Success Metric: Reduce teachers' administrative burden by 20%

2. Open Communication Forums

Driver: Perception lack of open, safe communication

• Schedule mandatory listening sessions with no administrators present (facilitated by external consultant)

• Establish anonymous digital feedback channel with guaranteed 48-hour response time

• Create "no retaliation" policy for honest feedback, communicated in writing

• Near-term Success Metric: 100% teacher participation in at least one feedback channel

• Longer Term Success Metric: Improved open communication scores of future anonymous climate surveys

  
  

Longer-Term Interventions

3. Work Environment Quick Wins

Driver: Perceived poor work environment quality

• Allocate emergency budget for immediate classroom needs (supplies, technology)

• Create quiet teacher workspace separate from student areas

• Implement listening sessions to discuss top perceived environmental gaps and strategize short and longer term fixes

• Success Metric: 30% improvement in environment satisfaction scores

4. Supervisor Expectations Reset

• Supervisor training on realistic goal-setting (using SMART framework)

• Establish teacher-supervisor compacts with mutually agreed expectations

• Implement weekly check-ins replacing lengthy performance reviews

• Success Metric: Meaningful improvement in supervisor expectation dissatisfaction in future anonymous climate surveys

To explore how to access Benchmarking for Good no cost Faculty Employer of Choice research grants, please contact Dr. Harry Bloom at harrybloom@benchmarkingforgood.org