1. This piece is the third and final part of an academic literature review
commissioned by the CYRA Service research assistance company, which
specialises in the childhood and youth field.
Fostering Teacher Resilience
Having identified some of the main reasons why significant numbers of
teachers leave the profession for good, often within the first few years of
qualifying, the obvious next step is to find a means of addressing these issues
and halting the exodus.
Resilience in the context of teaching has engendered a large amount of interest
in recent years. It is by now widely acknowledged, in academic literature and
studies, (see, for example, (Beltman, Mansfield, & Harris, 2016; Mansfield,
Beltman, & Price, 2014; McCallum & Price, 2010; Parker, Martin, Colmar, &
Liem, 2012), that the key to reducing teacher attrition is in providing the
necessary support and environment in schools to assist new teachers in
developing resilience to the stresses and pressures of everyday situations in
the classroom. There seems to be no single agreement, however, on exactly
what form that support should take, nor on the best ways to integrate chosen
methods into the school environment.
Methods and methodology
Perhaps the first logical move towards giving relevant support to new teachers
should come even before graduation, to ‘provide relevant, rigorous and
responsive pre-service preparation for the profession’, (Johnson et al., 2012).
Positive, realistic experiences, information and support given to pre-service
teachers may offset some of the seemingly unexpected issues, (Ewing, 2005),
such as workload, class sizes, parents and administration tasks (Burke et al.,
2013), faced by new teachers who may have a somewhat rose-tinted view of
the profession before experiencing full involvement with it.
A programme of mentoring by seasoned teachers of their novice colleagues
would seem to be an obvious approach, but there are differing opinions on the
best methods of conducting such a programme. Gordon & Lowrey (2016), for
example, advocate the construction of a relatively formal ‘mentoring web’ to
provide a safety net of support for new teachers. The addition of a more
informal and social approach to this can also be of value and has been shown
to not only make new teachers feel affectively connected to their peers, but
also to the school itself (Struyve et al., 2016). Yet another mentoring option is
Reciprocal Mentoring, in which two equally matched but differently skilled
teachers work together in support of each other. This differs radically from
traditional one-way mentoring in that the flow of support travels in both
directions (Paris, 2013). Paris asserts that this method works well for pre-
service and new teachers, as it avoids the tendency for them to be viewed in
the usual negative light of having lack of experience and teaching skills, putting
great value on previous experience outside the profession, and giving a head
start in imbuing a sense of self-worth and confidence. A further extension of
this is the Quality Teaching Rounds system, formulated in Australia (Gore &

2. Bowe, 2015), which uses ‘Professional Learning Community’ groups of up to
eight teachers who support each other by discussion, individual coding and
each teaching observed lessons over a period of time, giving one another
feedback, support and building personal and professional relationships
between them.
A recurring theme in studies of teacher resilience is, perhaps unsurprisingly,
the very significant role that relationships play, more traditionally inside the
school environment with colleagues and students (Mansfield, Beltman,
Broadley, & Weatherby-Fell., 2016), but also in a wider context involving
support from friends and family (Beltman et al., 2016; Papatraianou & Le
Cornu, 2014). Spilt, Koomen, & Thijs, (2011) note that there has been much
investigation for many years into the importance of student/teacher
relationships for good child development, with particular emphasis on the
emotional wellbeing of the child, but that only relatively recently have studies
been undertaken into the way that these relationships influence the personal
and professional lives of teachers and their emotional wellbeing, (Salter-Jones,
2012).
One comprehensive study (Mansfield et al., op.cit.), puts forward a review-
based, collated and detailed overview of factors contributing to fostering
early-career resilience, which somewhat simplifies the perceived necessary
requirements. The study identifies that teacher resilience can be thought of as
a combination of three basic elements – a capacity, a process and an outcome,
which can be further sub-divided into more specific factors. The first is defined
as the capacity of teachers to make use of personal and environmental
resources to work through difficult tasks or situations. The process is the
synergy between a teacher’s professional and personal ecologies, and their
own individual characteristics as they employ these selected approaches,
resulting in the outcome of well-rounded and resilient teachers who
experience ‘professional engagement and growth, commitment, enthusiasm,
satisfaction and wellbeing’ (ibid. p. 8).
This is obviously very much the desired goal if teacher attrition is to be
effectively addressed. Teachers who feel valued, fulfilled and effective will be
much less likely to want to leave the profession.
Beltman, S., Mansfield, C. F., & Harris, A. (2016). Quietly sharing the load? The
role of school psychologists in enabling teacher resilience. School
Psychology International, 37(2), 172–188. Retrieved from
http://spi.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/37/2/172
Burke, P. F., Schuck, S., Aubusson, P., Buchanan, J., Louviere, J. J., & Prescott, A.
(2013). Why do early career teachers choose to remain in the
profession? The use of best-worst scaling to quantify key factors.
International Journal of Educational Research, 62, 259–268.
Ewing, R., & Manuel, J., (2005). Retaining quality early career teachers in the
profession: New teacher narratives.

3. Gordon, E., & Lowrey, K. A. (2016). The mentoring web – Coming together to
make a difference. Improving Schools, Published .
http://doi.org/10.1177/1365480216650310
Gore, J. M., & Bowe, J. M. (2015). Interrupting attrition? Re-shaping the
transition from preservice to inservice teaching through Quality
Teaching Rounds. International Journal of Educational Research, 73, 77–
88.
Johnson, Down, Cornu, L., Peters, Sulivan, Pearce, & Hunter. (2012). A
Framework of Conditions Supporting Early Career Teacher ( ECT )
Resilience, 2012.
Mansfield, C., Beltman, S., & Price, A. (2014). “I”m coming back again!’ The
resilience process of early career teachers. Teachers and Teaching, 20(5),
547–567. http://doi.org/10.1080/13540602.2014.937958
Mansfield, C. F., Beltman, S., Broadley, T., & Weatherby-Fell, N. (2016).
Building resilience in teacher education: An evidenced informed
framework. Teaching and Teacher Education. Elsevier Ltd.
McCallum, F., & Price, D. (2010). Well teachers , well students. Journal of
Student Wellbeing, 4(1), 19–34.
Papatraianou, L. H., & Le Cornu, R. (2014). Problematising the role of
personal and professional relationships in early career teacher
resilience. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 39(1), 7.
http://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.14221/ajte.2014v39n1.7
Paris, L. F. (2013). Reciprocal mentoring: Can it help prevent attrition for
beginning teachers? Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 38(6), 9.
http://doi.org/http://dx.doi.org/10.14221/ajte.2013v38n6.5
Parker, P. D., Martin, A. J., Colmar, S., & Liem, G. A. (2012). Teachers’
workplace well-being: Exploring a process model of goal orientation,
coping behavior, engagement, and burnout. Teaching and Teacher
Education, 28(4), 503–513.
Salter-Jones, E. (2012). Promoting the emotional well-being of teaching staff
in secondary schools. Educational and Child Psychology, 29(4), 18–31.
Spilt, J. L., Koomen, H. M. Y., & Thijs, J. T. (2011). Teacher Wellbeing: The
Importance of Teacher-Student Relationships. Educational Psychology
Review, 23(4), 457–477. http://doi.org/10.1007/s10648-011-9170-y
Struyve, C., Daly, A., Vandecandelaere, M., Meredith, C., Hannes, K., & De
Fraine, B. (2016). More than a mentor. Journal of Professional Capital and
Community, 1(3), 198–218. http://doi.org/10.1108/JPCC-01-2016-0002