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How Being In A Relationship Affects Teaching Workload

26 October 2017

A Teacher Tapp panelist asked on Twitter if we could look into the number of teachers in a relationship with other teachers. So we did!

It turns out, a lot of you are giving furtive glances across the staffroom because:

A staggering 24% of Teacher Tapp panelists are coupled up with another teacher ?

Reasons for this could include: people meeting at work; the dove-tailing of holidays and early mornings; similar interests; and straightforward numbers — there are around half a million teachers in England and Wales.

But, we asked the data, does partnering up with a fellow teacher help your work-life balance?

Result: Yes, a tiny bit! ?

People partnered with a teacher were a touch more likely to agree (or strongly agree) that their personal and professional commitments were positively balanced compared to those whose partner was not a teacher.

That said, single teachers beat both groups.  They were much more likely to ‘strongly agree’ they had a good balance between personal and professional commitments. HOWEVER single teachers were also the group most likely to feel their personal-private priorities were way out of line.

Hence: being a single teacher is risky!

It seems likely the issue for single teachers is that they are most able to balance commitments (as fewer people are involved) but also most prone to becoming over-committed (possibly because it’s harder to say ‘no’ when colleagues have family commitments and the single teacher does not).

Worst of all worlds, however, seems to be teachers partnered with non-teachers. Not one of them strongly agreed their work-life balance was good, and far more disagreed than the other groups. Sorry folks! ?

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Other Recommended Reads:

Which Teachers Have The Most Freedom?

Why Are Teachers Working So Many Hours?