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There was no single reason why Ryan Higgins decided to leave teaching.

It was a job he loved: invigorating, unpredictable, a chance to make the world a bit better. But several years into his career, Higgins, who taught high school social studies in the Fort Worth, Texas area, was increasingly frustrated.

For one, his salary 鈥� decent when he was fresh out of college in 2016 鈥� felt stagnant and mediocre. He coached basketball and football, so his days often stretched from early morning to late evening. And 鈥渢eacher appreciation week鈥� began to feel borderline demeaning: You can wear jeans all week! There鈥檚 free pizza in the teachers鈥� lounge!

Then there was the time a parent complained after he chewed out and benched a member of the basketball team who was slacking off. The school鈥檚 assistant principal didn鈥檛 back Higgins up. Yes, maybe he had been a bit too tough, but he was also giving up his Saturdays, doing students鈥� laundry, and even driving the bus.

鈥淵ou鈥檙e running around like crazy trying to solve problems, and yet people who aren鈥檛 with you are always telling you what you need to do better,鈥� Higgins says.

What finally pushed him out was the aftermath of the pandemic. Trying to effectively teach students over Zoom was all but impossible. Then when students returned to classrooms, they were breathtakingly behind academically and socially. Behavior was out of control. Parents, it seemed, were less trusting of teachers, too. 鈥淚t felt like the walls were closing in,鈥� he says.

Higgins left teaching in the summer of 2022. A member of the Army Reserve, he soon took an assignment overseas. Today, he鈥檚 going into his third year of law school. He sees himself as part of a 鈥渓ost generation鈥� of teachers.

The year Higgins left, more teachers departed public school classrooms in Texas than at any point since at least 2007, the earliest year with state data. This was not just a blip: From 2020 to 2025, the state lost 35,000 teachers who would have stayed in the classroom if the state had maintained its pre-pandemic turnover figures. That鈥檚 equivalent to nearly 10% of the current teacher workforce.

The pattern in Texas has repeated to varying degrees in states across the country, according to an extensive Chalkbeat analysis of data since 2019 spanning 21 states. Most of those states have experienced four to five straight years of elevated teacher turnover, compounding the losses year after year. High-poverty schools in particular were already having a hard time keeping teachers.

Even though turnover finally appears to be trending down, the consequences persist. Research has to . At a moment when policymakers are seeking to , the loss of teachers and instability in schools deserves to be on the list of plausible contributors.

[See our聽聽including detailed data from each state. You can also聽聽about teacher turnover.]

A teacher turnover dip, then a sustained rise

There is no comprehensive national data on teacher exit rates. To fill this gap, I conducted an extensive state-by-state review, using a variety of sources.

Across most states, a pattern emerged: Compared with 2019, fewer teachers left in the summer of 2020 when the economy was at a standstill due to the pandemic. But then . Rates peaked in 2022 but typically remained elevated for the next couple years.

Only a couple of states in this analysis, Connecticut and Maryland, avoided any meaningful rise in turnover.

A spokesperson for the Texas Education Agency said the state has 鈥渆xperienced many of the workforce challenges seen nationwide, which is why teacher recruitment and retention remain a priority.鈥� Texas, for instance, has expanded a merit pay program, which , according to a recent study.

High-poverty schools, which struggled with teacher churn before the pandemic, likely suffered the most from the turnover spike. In South Carolina, for instance, exit rates rose especially sharply at those schools. A number of states have reported increases in , , and educators. Those teachers are typically concentrated in high-poverty schools.

It hasn鈥檛 just been teachers departing. In , , , , and principal attrition rose too. Turnover often has a cascading effect in schools. When a principal leaves, an assistant principal may take over, a teacher may become an assistant principal 鈥� and another classroom vacancy opens up.

Justin Wax became principal of a junior high school in southeast Louisiana in 2021. He was the third leader in three years. That made keeping staff harder since many were looking for stability at that moment. Most of the teachers who were at the school when he started are now gone. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e scraping the cream off of the top of all of the most veteran people,鈥� Wax says. 鈥淭here ends up being a vacuum.鈥�

Turnover appears to be finally coming . In the 12 states with figures through last summer, rates were below post-pandemic highs, although some places have not fully returned to pre-pandemic levels.

Wax says he鈥檚 had his best year of retention recently and is well staffed going into this coming school year. He鈥檚 prioritized making his school a supportive community where teachers are given professional autonomy and backed up on student discipline issues. Today, surveys show that from pandemic-era spikes. Most teachers are at least somewhat with their jobs.

More comprehensive recent data on turnover is not available because many states report figures with a significant lag. Other states numbers at all. And no state appears to have data yet for the share of teachers who have left this summer.

Teachers face worse behavior, stagnant pay, fewer perks

What drove the sharp increase in teacher exits?

Meghann Seril has been teaching elementary school in Los Angeles for 18 years. These days, she finds students鈥� behavior more challenging and their attention spans more limited. She鈥檚 seen many colleagues who struggled with classroom management leave in recent years.

鈥淚t has such a ripple effect because the administrator is focused on supporting those new teachers,鈥� she says. 鈥淵ou鈥檙e working on putting out little fires all of the time.鈥� In surveys, teachers that student behavior is their , and many reported that behavioral issues after school buildings reopened.

Meanwhile, many other professionals have received a new perk since the pandemic: the ability to work from home. 鈥淏eing a teacher is arguably the least flexible job around,鈥� says Alex Baron, principal of a charter middle school in Washington, D.C. He suspects that鈥檚 made it difficult to recruit and retain teachers in his school.

At the same time, teacher salaries, never particularly high, have in real dollars, as inflation soared and school officials used new funds to rather than give teachers a raise. The salary gap between teachers and other college-educated professionals in recent years.

Tyra Damm鈥檚 decision to leave teaching came down to money. Some of her colleagues with higher-earning spouses saw teaching as a nice-to-have second income. One called it 鈥渇un money.鈥� Damm, who lives in the Dallas suburbs, did not have that luxury. She took up teaching in 2013, soon after her husband died of brain cancer. She figured it would provide a stable income with a parent-friendly schedule as she raised two young children.

She loved the job. Damm most recently taught middle school reading and writing to gifted and talented students and was named secondary teacher of the year in her district in 2019. But with only anemic raises and the price of everything rising, 鈥淚 just couldn鈥檛 pay the bills anymore,鈥� she says.

When the American Heart Association, which she had done freelance writing for, offered her a full-time job with remote work and higher pay, Damm felt like she had no choice but to take it. She left teaching in 2024.

鈥淚 miss it every day,鈥� she says.

This story was originally published by Chalkbeat. Sign up for their newsletters at .

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