Student attainment and staff wellbeing

Mark Solomons, CEO of School Wellbeing Accelerator - an acclaimed wellbeing expert with over 12 years’ experience developing leadership and culture in schools and creator of Welbee a highly effective online evaluation and staff wellbeing improvement tool, winner of the ERA 2022 Wellbeing Award and GESS Judges Commendation Award 2022 – discusses the impact of teacher wellbeing on student attainment.

We are nearing the end of the academic year, and time for the final assessments of student progress, but do we consider the impact of staff wellbeing on student attainment? We all recognise the importance of the relationship between teaching staff and their students. Teaching and learning is not just a straightforward transfer of knowledge, it is a complex social interaction. Where there is a strong rapport, clear expectations, communication and trust, students flourish. Apart from academics, teachers help develop attitudes for achievement and excellence, motivating students, building self-confidence and skills for life.

So what happens when teachers are unable to give their best due to stress or anxiety? If a teacher’s wellbeing is impacted, how does that effect their students’ attainment and how can we address it?

If their teacher is constantly feeling overwhelmed, stressed and unsupported, the students’ experience is likely to be very different.

While research into staff wellbeing in education is limited, available studies show a statistically significant link, and in some cases a causal one, between staff self-reported wellbeing and the attainment and outcomes of students. The role wellbeing plays in improving results is also supported through wider research in business and more significantly in the health sector.

Research in business shows staff wellbeing has a strong and positive link with improved workplace performance, financial profitability, labour productivity, outputs and services. Evidence shows a connection between wellbeing and job satisfaction, and aspects such as training, skills development, opportunities and the level of staff autonomy.

Within the health sector, research has consistently shown staff wellbeing linked to patient care, welfare and mortality. Highlights from findings include evidence of a causal link between staff wellbeing and performance outcomes, and a relationship between staff wellbeing and staff-reported patient care, patient-reported patient care and hospital mortality rates.

In education there is a plethora of research on student attainment, but until quite recently, little focussed on the impact of teacher wellbeing. In 2019, a project carried out in UK primary schools by Professor J Glazzard and Dr A Rose, revealed the perceptiveness of students towards their teachers mood and wellbeing, and its impact upon them – children are masters of observation, especially of adult behaviours. The study showed:

‘…children were attuned to their teacher’s mood and could usually pick up when they were feeling stressed, even if teachers tried to hide it. Teachers were seen as ‘stressed’ by children when they were: unusually short tempered; ..they got upset when pupils did not understand the work they were given; classroom behaviour deteriorated; and less work than usual was completed in lessons.’

The study also showed the children’s high levels of concern for the teacher, and their attempts to accommodate the teacher’s mood by ‘behaving, doing something nice for the teacher to cheer them up, and giving the teacher time to get their jobs done’.