Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the effect of teachers' working patterns on job satisfaction.

There is evidence that part time and other types of flexible working can benefit employees, and may contribute to improved retention in both primary and secondary schools. For example, recent research from the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER)[1] on teacher retention recommended that schools should consider how to implement flexible working opportunities. The Department also carried out a survey of teacher workload and working hours in 2016[2], and committed to gathering information on teacher workload every two years.

My Right Hon Friend, The Secretary of State for education held a national summit on flexible working in October, which examined the role of Government and others in improving flexible working opportunities for teachers. As a result of the summit. more than 60 pledges were made by the Department, schools and other organisations. Departmental guidance was published this year to help teachers who are considering working flexibly, and to help schools and employers to encourage, support, and enable flexible working requests. The guidance, and a new policy paper on increasing flexible working opportunities in schools, can be found here: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/increasing-flexible-working-in-schools/increasing-flexible-working-opportunities-in-schools.

[1] https://www.nfer.ac.uk/publications/LFSB01/LFSB01.pdf

[2] https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/teacher-workload-survey-2016