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The straw that breaks the camel's back: how can we protect our mid-career teachers from burnout?

Time: 9:30am - 12:30pm

Fees
Member - £99
Non-Member - £149

Facilitators - Emma Sheppard and Nicola Mooney

Mid-career teachers make up two thirds of our workforce and are relied upon as experienced practitioners, nurturing mentors, and school leaders.  But when many of these colleagues are balancing heavy responsibilities at school with caring, parenting and domestic duties at home, how much is too much for them to manage?

In this three-hour workshop, The Straw that Breaks the Camel’s Back, MTPT Project Founder, Emma Sheppard, and Deputy Headteacher, Nicola Mooney, will share key information about our mid-career demographic – who they are, what they’re doing professionally and personally, and why they are invaluable to our students and schools.  We’ll explore the experiences of our groups most vulnerable to burnout, poor wellbeing and attrition.  Participants will gain fascinating insight into research exclusive to The MTPT Project and develop an understanding of all the different straws that can break the back of our mid-career colleagues.  Once we’ve understood the problem, we’ll spend time sharing tried and tested solutions, exploring which options are most accessible, realistic and impactful for your school context and the needs of individual colleagues.

Participants will leave the session empowered to make meaningful changes to policies and practices that will improve the wellbeing of not just our mid-career teachers, but also the colleagues and students they support.

Aims

  • Understand what the research says about the wellbeing of mid-career teachers and how this is linked to retention, student outcomes, career progression and gender equality in our schools
  • Learn from a range of case studies from school leaders, and mid-career teachers who have stayed in, and left the profession
  • Have a range of practical strategies to support teacher wellbeing over the mid-career stage
  • Understand which of these strategies will be most effective, and most realistic to implement in your specific school context
  • Understand how strategies to support the wellbeing of mid-career teachers can

Audience

School leaders - Head teachers, Deputy head teachers and SLT including SBLs. Primary, Secondary, Special and APs suitable.

Facilitators

Emma Sheppard and Nicola Mooney

Nicola Mooney is a teacher and Senior Leader with over 20 years' experience. She holds the NASENCO and has just finished the NPQH. As part of the wider educational agenda, she works with the MTPT project, is a regional network lead for WomenEd, is a member of ASCL’s Women Leaders Network and a trustee for the Driver Youth Trust Literacy Charity. In addition to this she has four sons under the age of 17. Nicola is a ‘leadership and lifestyle’ edublogger writing widely about combining work and a busy home life.

Emma Sheppard is the founder of the The Maternity Teacher Paternity Teacher Project (MTPT), the UK’s charity for parent-teachers which seeks to inspire, empower and connect teachers choosing to complete CPD whilst on parental leave.  A former Lead Practitioner and English teacher, Emma retrained as a coach in 2021.  Since 2016 she has worked with the DfE, schools and network partners such as WomenEd to improve working conditions for parent-teachers, and completed the only study into the retention and attrition of female teachers aged 30-39, the largest demographic to leave teaching every year. 

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