Newly launched study predicts looming wave of teacher retirements

A RECENTLY launched study predicts an incoming wave of teacher retirements with nearly 50% of public sector teachers in South Africa already aged 50 years and older.

A first in the series of a larger three-year research project, the Teacher Demographic Dividend project released today was conducted by more than 20 Stellenbosch University researchers in the Research on Socio-economic Policy (Resep) unit.

Headed by professors Nic Spaull and Servaas van der Berg, the project will run from 2022 to 2024.

Some of the report’s findings include: Half of the country’s public sector teachers (49%) were aged over 50 in 2021. In 2019 the average teacher in South Africa earned R42 668 a month (including all benefits), placing teachers in the top 5% of the income distribution. Younger teachers have considerably higher levels of content knowledge than older teachers, especially in maths.

“In 2013, just over 7 800 public sector educators aged 55+ had left in the previous year, a number that rose to just under 12 500 in 2021,” said authors Van der Berg and professor Martin Gustafsson.

The report also found that about half of teachers leaving the public sector teaching annually are below the official retirement age of 55.

Researcher Poppie Ntaka said the learner-educator ratios were rising because provinces were not hiring.

Education activist Hendrick Makaneta said it was true that more and more teachers leave the system before retirement age, due to unsafe learning environments, particularly in townships.

Education MEC David Maynier said the situation was not as serious in the Western Cape.

“The percentage of teachers under the age of 30 has increased significantly, from 8% in 2012 to 19% in 2021. The majority of our teachers (63%) are below the age of 50.

Maynier said the province had a solid supply of young graduates with 1 500 education students graduating in the province annually.