00:00 The smiles on her students' faces when they get it is what keeps Brittany Harrington in
00:07 this job.
00:10 In my classroom we have children at a year 5 level but I also have children whose academic
00:16 needs are at a kindy level.
00:20 But meeting those needs can come at a heavy cost. Brittany says she spent thousands of
00:25 dollars of her own money on classroom supplies and puts in 20 hours of overtime a week.
00:32 I cannot tell you how many nights I've spent crying thinking about some of my kids and
00:39 what their future might be like, what their present is like.
00:44 Just three years into her career she's thinking about quitting.
00:48 It is way more stressful and a lot more work than I could have ever really anticipated
00:55 it being.
00:56 A new survey by the Australian Education Union shows many of her peers feel the same.
01:03 Nearly 40 per cent of public school teachers in the first three years of their careers
01:08 plan to leave within a decade. That number has nearly doubled in three years.
01:14 While the share of teachers planning to stay in their careers until retirement has almost
01:19 halved.
01:21 Governments need to focus on the issues that new educators are saying are making them leave
01:26 the profession.
01:27 We don't have enough teachers. Part of that's pay, part of that's workload, part of it's
01:32 about respect, how we as a country respect what our teachers do.
01:36 But until more teachers come on board the demands will continue.
01:41 The kids are okay and they're getting what they need at the expense of their teachers
01:45 and school leaders' wellbeing.
01:48 Teachers say it's a model that can't be sustained for long.
01:51 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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