Global early childhood education workforce shortages have highlighted the importance of recruitment and retention. The development of effective leadership has not been a retention policy focus even though effective leadership has been identified as an important driver for improving working conditions and supporting educator retention. The aim of…

This paper reviews current literature and research relevant to the Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) Early Childhood Education (ECE) workforce in Australia, including data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Australia is a highly multicultural society, with one out of every three people born overseas. Anecdotally, the…

Staffing rural and regional schools remains an intractable problem. This study identifies effective incentives for attracting teachers to difficult-to-staff rural and remote schools in New South Wales (NSW), Australia. Compared to their urban counterparts, students in these schools are disadvantaged by teacher staff shortages, inexperience and…

Drawing on an existing typology, this study used latent transition profile analysis (LTPA) to examine changes in the striving and wellbeing profiles among teachers from their early until midcareer. Five profiles were identified (Sparing, Good Health, Ambitious, Burnout, and Wornout) among a longitudinal sample of 414 Australian secondary and…

Teacher shortages have intensified across several OECD countries, making this an urgent priority for education systems. Between 2015 and 2022, the share of students whose principals reported shortages rose from 29% to 46.7% on average across the OECD. Simultaneously, rapid technological advances, such as artificial intelligence (AI), and broader…

Since the mid-1980s, the working lives of teachers has become an enduring research topic. Much research has focused on early-career teachers and is often reported from deficit positions, i.e. why they leave the profession. However, career trajectory studies have described a small cohort of veteran teachers who remain positive and committed to…

This article considers the construct of "teacher resilience" from critical discourse and labour process perspectives in order to cast new light on what has been traditionally viewed from a psychological perspective. In this respect, the construct of resilience is placed in the broad political landscape of teachers' work and the labour…

The complex and ever-changing nature of teachers' work challenges their well-being. Teacher well-being and "fitness" includes versatility, mental strength, and commitment to promote effective teaching and learning. In framing this notion, we seek to understand the ecological influences impacting on teacher well-being and…

In 2015, for the first time in its history, PISA (the Programme for International Student Assessment) asked teachers to describe the various aspects of their working environment and teaching practices. This paper examines how teacher, student, and school characteristics are related to science teachers' satisfaction in 19 PISA-participating…

The paper draws on research --- "Tellin' the stories of teachers: Tellin' the stories of teaching" project --- that forms part of the national More Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Teachers Initiative. This Initiative aims to increase the number and retention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples in the profession. A…

The attraction and retention of teachers is a problem faced by schools worldwide and possibly more so in the public sector. One possible solution to this problem is likely to be better targeting of attraction and retention drivers of value to teachers. This paper presents the findings from a qualitative study conducted in Australia. The study used…

In this paper, we explore the circumstances leading to an elementary teacher's decision to leave the profession. We analyse her accounts of eleven years of teaching using a storyline technique and a framework provided by the five aspects of teacher self-understandings (Kelchtermans, 2009). We also analyse the interplay between vulnerability,…

In this chapter, the authors examine developments in the teacher workforce and in the occupation of teaching across recent generations. They take their point of departure from the perspective of prevailing policy discourse on enduring problems of educational equity, asking not only how teaching has evolved in recent decades but more specifically…

Allegations that the most able teachers intend to leave teaching were challenged by qualitative and quantitative data collected from prospective teachers completing their credentialling diploma at the University of Queensland. A multiple classification analysis showed that those who were confident of promotion, committed to and satisfied by…

This paper reports on a longitudinal case study of an elementary teacher during her transition from preservice to inservice teaching. Bandura's (1995) concept of self-efficacy belief is used as a framework for presenting the findings of the study. The subject's experiences in science teaching provided information about her competency as a teacher,…