Teacher Attrition and Mobility: Results From the 2012–13 Teacher Follow-up Survey

Of the 3,377,900 public school teachers who were teaching during the 2011–12 school year, 84 percent remained at the same school (“stayers”), 8 percent moved to a different school (“movers”), and 8 percent left the profession (“leavers”) during the following year. 

About 30 percent of public school teacher movers and 10 percent of public school teacher leavers left their 2011–12 positions involuntarily. 

Among public school teachers who left the profession in 2012–13, about 8 percent moved to an occupation outside the field of education, including military service.

First collected in school year 1988–89, the Teacher Follow-up Survey (TFS) was designed as a component of the Schools and Staffing Survey (SASS) and was sponsored by the National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) of the Institute of Education Sciences within the U.S. Department of Education. 

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