Here’s Why Teachers Over 50 Are Leaving The Profession – And It Is Nothing To With Workload (Anna Browning); The Paradigm Shift of Teaching in the AI Era: Reflection on a Transformative Moment (Manuel Gentile, Giuseppe Città, Salvatore Perna and Mario Allegra); Why being forced to precisely follow a curriculum harms teachers and students (Cara Elizabeth Furman)
Here’s Why Teachers Over 50 Are Leaving The Profession – And It Is Nothing To With Workload
This week, I revisited an article that has stayed with me since I first read it: Anna Browning’s “Here’s Why Teachers Over 50 Are Leaving the Profession”. Written in 2023, it reflects the author’s defiant disillusionment with modern education systems after three decades as a teacher. While Browning’s experiences stem from the English system, her insights resonate deeply with my own (nearly 40 years) as an Australian educator. The themes she explores—autonomy, accountability, and the erosion of trust in teachers – speak to shared challenges across borders.
Browning describes a systemic return to what she calls a “Victorian model” of education, one focused on privilege, hierarchy and conformity. She argues that the creativity, individuality, and progressive ideals that initially defined her career have been replaced by a bureaucratic model characterised by rigid structures and relentless testing. As Browning powerfully states, “We test, test, test and test again. And we value what we test instead of testing what we value.”
The article also critiques tokenistic approaches to diversity and wellbeing. While many schools promote these as priorities, Browning asserts that they rarely translate into meaningful change. This observation also resonates in Australia where many schools and systems ‘talk the talk’ of social justice but don’t fully live their values. Browning proposes that this gap between rhetoric and reality is particularly stark for marginalised students, including LGBTIQA+ youth, who often remain “othered by the system.”
Perhaps most striking is Browning’s observation about the loss of teacher autonomy. She writes of a time when teachers were trusted to decide what, when, and how to teach. Today, she says, educators are micromanaged, monitored, and held accountable for factors far beyond their control. This culture of blame and distrust leaves many teachers feeling alienated from the profession they once loved.
The final line of this article lingers for me long after I first read it. Browning perhaps speaks for many teachers when she states: “We signed up to be the change we wanted to see in the world, but the world of education has gone backwards, not forwards, and we are no longer aligned to the system we are working in intellectually, emotionally or spiritually.” For many, this sums up why experienced teachers are leaving the classroom in droves – not because they can’t handle the demands, but because the demands no longer align with their values. The challenge for many teachers is now to ‘bend their knee’ to the system or to try and change the system from within… and thereby run the risk of becoming complicit in its harms.
Browning’s reflection is a sobering reminder of the urgent need for systemic reform. It challenges us to reconsider how we value teaching, learning, and the people who make it possible.
The Paradigm Shift of Teaching in the AI Era: Reflection on a Transformative Moment
This week, I explored Gentile, Città, Perna, and Allegra’s 2023 paper, “Do We Still Need Teachers? Navigating the Paradigm Shift of the Teacher’s Role in the AI Era.” This thought-provoking article delves into how Artificial Intelligence (AI) is not only transforming education but also demanding a fundamental rethinking of its core purposes and practices. As an educator, the ideas in this paper resonate deeply, sparking both challenge and opportunity.
The authors argue that the integration of AI into education signals nothing less than a genuine paradigm shift. Unlike previous technological advances, AI acts as an agent, capable of initiating interactions, customising learning, and disrupting traditional teacher-student dynamics. This shift prompts us to reconsider essential questions: What is the purpose of schooling in a world mediated by AI? Why do educators and students come together in shared spaces? What happens when data—abundant yet noisy—becomes the centre of educational practice?
Central to this paper is the recognition that technology is no longer a mere tool but an active participant in education. AI’s capabilities, such as real-time data analysis and personalised learning, free teachers from routine tasks like grading and administrative duties. Yet, as the authors emphasise, the relationship between teacher and student remains irreplaceable. They write, “The relationship between teacher and learners, with the interactions that arise and develop within it, is one of the most critical elements in the context of the educational paradigm.”
This article also explores the potential for AI to shift education from teacher-centred to learner-centred models. The authors describe how AI enables personalised learning paths, empowering students to explore at their own pace while challenging teachers to focus on fostering critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration. As they aptly summarise, “The shift in the centre of gravity of teaching processes and models from teacher-centred to learner-centred through AI frees the teacher.”
mportantly, the authors conclude with a bold proposal: a manifesto for the new role of teachers. They call for educators to move beyond traditional disciplinary goals and embrace a humanistic approach that prioritises the teacher playing “a more significant role in shaping people, their brains, souls, and moral values than before”. This manifesto envisions teachers as innovative guides who foster students’ skills in “collaboration, autonomy and exploration as well as the high-level cognitive processes that characterise them”.
Perhaps, to me, the article is most striking for making an implicit optimism about the emergence of schools as places for community, connection, and meaning-making – places of the inherently human. They see the world of AI in education as nothing other than a revolution.
I love the conclusion of this article where the authors paraphrase, Thomas Kuhn’s book on scientific revolutions: “paradigm changes do cause teachers to see the world of their teaching differently. … [A]fter a revolution, teachers are responding to a different world. […]
Sign me up for the revolution.
Why being forced to precisely follow a curriculum harms teachers and students
Cara Elizabeth Furman’s article, “Why Being Forced to Precisely Follow a Curriculum Harms Teachers and Students,” is a critique of the increasing control and micromanagement of educators. Furman draws from research and teacher interviews to explore how prescribed curricula and rigid teaching methods diminish professional autonomy and harm both educators and students.
Furman argues that over the past 20 years, teachers have seen a significant loss of control over their practice. This resonates with my lived experience as a teacher. She argues that the concept of “fidelity”- adhering strictly to specific procedures – has become synonymous with quality teaching in many schools. Furman challenges this, pointing out that while fidelity ensures consistency, it undermines the adaptability required to meet diverse student needs. Her findings echo earlier studies that show fidelity often interferes with a teacher’s ability to make ethical decisions that truly support their students. This rigid approach also drives many qualified educators out of the profession.
Furman points out that teachers often experience fidelity as creating an “oppressive environment”, a space in which teachers are pressured to follow scripts, provided lesson plans, lesson templates, and to stay on strict schedules, regardless of their students’ or classes’ unique learning needs or contexts. For example, one teacher in Furman’s study described being “boxed” into teaching methods that ignored the reality of her classroom. Such constraints clash with the evidence that learning is complex and context-specific, requiring teachers to adapt their lessons to best serve their students.
Furman argues persuasively that trust and flexibility are essential for effective teaching. One teacher in her study shared how switching to a supportive school environment, where her principal encouraged autonomy, transformed her teaching practice and lifted the weight of micromanagement. As Furman writes, “When teachers are trusted and given greater flexibility, they teach better. They also feel more supported.”
The article concludes with actionable steps for school and system leaders. The steps include advice to:
- Trust teachers. Assume good intentions and professional competence, recognising their expertise in meeting student needs.
- Follow the evidence. Avoid clinging to rigid curricula that contradict current research or classroom realities. Avoid following selectively chosen, cherry-picked research.
- Allow adaptability. Enable teachers to adjust content and methods to reflect their students’ cultures, contexts, and experiences.
This article is a timely reminder that education thrives when teachers are empowered to teach with flexibility, creativity, and respect for their students’ individuality. At a time when workload issues are purported to be the reasons why teachers are leaving the profession, it challenges us all to think more broadly. It the solution to teacher workloads is the provision of ‘high-fidelity’, shared, centrally created (AI-created?) teaching materials, we may lose more from our education systems than we have bargained for. This is an article which urges school leaders to resist the allure of rigid standardisation and instead embrace the complexity and humanity of learning.
Disrupted History 