This special issue of the BERA Blog introduces research-informed articles addressing teachers’ work and wellbeing across seven national/regional education systems: Scotland; England; Wales; Ireland; Alberta (Canada); Tennessee (US); and Victoria (Australia). Contributors include educational researchers and teacher association officials, offering diverse perspectives on common challenges affecting education systems across these regions.

This collection of blog posts demonstrates remarkable consistency in findings across diverse international contexts. The challenges facing teachers transcend national boundaries. The contributions collectively reject framing teacher wellbeing as primarily a matter of personal resilience or coping strategies. Instead, they advocate reframing wellbeing as a structural phenomenon requiring systemic response.

The contributions to this issue explore: 

• falling recruitment and rising attrition endangering educational capacity
• emotional, intellectual, ethical and work intensity demands that combine to create unsustainable pressure on educators
• the increasing complexity of student needs coupled with diminishing specialist support
• how access to specialist support for language and communication, social-emotional development and neurodiversity has diminished in Scotland
• a disconnect between the tasks teachers are required to perform and the ethical and moral principles that inform their professional practice
• the concept of moral distress to explain the conflict teachers experience when they’re unable to act according to their ethical judgment
• conflicts between care teachers’ wish to extend versus what’s possible with limited resources; educational aims versus market-driven priorities; and professional responsibilities versus personal wellbeing
• theoretical frameworks including Job Demands–Resources theory, moral distress theory and ecological models of resilience.