The impact of job demand, control and support on New York State elementary teachers’ stress levels during the COVID-19 pandemic

ABSTRACT

This mixed-methods study draws on survey data collected from 268 elementary school educators working in New York State to explore the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on levels of stress and job dissatisfaction. Through the lens of the Job Demand-Control-Support (JCDS) framework, we explore factors which exacerbated educators’ stress levels and those which may have mitigated them. Quantitative analysis shows that having more demands relative to control and support was associated with increased work-related stress, work-life balance challenges and job dissatisfaction. Qualitative findings further elucidate the experiences of stress experienced by elementary school teachers during the pandemic as well as the significance of job control and support. The article concludes by discussing implications for policymakers, leaders and educators seeking to better support elementary school educators in this post-pandemic moment. We also weigh the utility of the JDCS framework in exploring the issue of stress among educators during the pandemic.

KEYWORDS:

• Primary school
• teacher burnout
• mixed-methods
• job dissatisfaction
• work-life balance

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 A full report on the methods and procedures used for this research is available on the researchers’ website (Wilcox et al. 2022).

2 New York State was hit by the COVID-19 pandemic relatively early and hard compared to the rest of the United States. In March 2020, all public schools were closed to in-person instruction and most remained closed throughout the remainder of the year followed by shifts between remote and in-person instruction throughout the 2020–2021 school year as infection levels rose and fell across the state. As New York is a demographically diverse state, with considerable variation in populations served and resources in different regions, the COVID-19 pandemic affected different communities in very different ways.