There are a variety of reasons why middle school teachers may be slightly more likely to leave. Middle
school is a time of marked social transition as well as academic transition. Class sizes tend to be larger than ele-
mentary school, and students are often experiencing alternating block schedules for the first time. In addition to
some of the structural differences between elementary school and middle school, the element of social transi-
tion may be a factor in the higher turnover rates seen at the middle school level. Elementary pedagogy includes
explicit instruction in social emotional learning, but middle school often does not.
Further evidence that suggests that teacher turnover is a problem that varies based on school-level
characteristics comes from examining the descriptive statistics for average teacher turnover by school. The
distribution is slightly positively skewed. The mean turnover rate is .23 while the median is .21. The mode
turnover rate is .33. The minimum teacher turnover was measured at .0 and the maximum was measured at .90,
so the range is .90. The spread of this range and the distance from the mean to mode turnover explains why the
distribution is skewed. Since this distribution demonstrates a slight positive skew, teacher retention rates cannot
be said to be random. A histogram depicting the distribution of teacher turnover follows.
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