Waybright named a handful of examples in a presentation Wednesday to a room full of educators at the Future of Education Technology Conference in Orlando, Fla. As an ed-tech coach and former elementary school teacher herself, she said she knows firsthand the stress and burdens of teaching today — how the lines between work and home life get blurred or erased — and she hopes to give educators the kinds of tips she wishes she had years ago.
“[Think about] the amount of decisions that we make before we even step foot in our offices or schools, until we’re home at night,” she said. “Then think about every hat that we have to wear as coaches, and that teachers have to wear when they are in the classroom — social worker, nurse, parent sometimes in different situations, content specialist, psychologist … any others needed on top of regular daily tasks.”
Waybright offered sobering statistics on the scope of the problem: 270,000 teachers expected to quit every year; 8 percent of teachers actually leaving the profession every year, with younger ones most likely to do so; and 55 percent saying they intend to leave sooner than they originally planned due to stress or burnout.
Among key technology-related stressors, she said, are one-on-one learning environments; the overwhelming number of new tools; the need for proficiency in various technologies; the bombardment of emails and digital notifications; online negativity; the ability of students, parents and other school staff to have 24/7 communication with them; and a general lack of support.
Looking at what is within the power of teachers to change and what technologies might support those changes, Waybright named five ways technology could help with any of four priorities to relieve teacher stress: setting boundaries, promoting digital positivity, increasing efficiency and increasing student engagement.
- Email signatures. Waybright recommended including a line at the bottom of an email signature to clearly delineate boundaries of communication. For example: “While email is checked daily, expect a response within 24-48 hours. Thank you for understanding.”
- Viva Insights. For those who use Microsoft, Waybright said this tool has functions that allow users to send praise to colleagues, book focus times for specific tasks, track quiet time and days without quiet time, learn more about their own collaboration and communication habits, and schedule notifications when it’s time to disconnect or start winding down for the day.
- Padlet. Library media specialists use this collaborative platform to share ideas and promote positivity. Waybright said some teachers use it to share a morning message with students every day, and she used it herself to share self-care ideas in a professional development session in lieu of an icebreaker. She said participants shared ideas for physical activity, sensory stimulation, emotional support, social experiences, and even comfort food and drinks.
- AI tools such as Canva AI, MagicSchool or Google’s Gemini to support efficiency. Waybright said teachers can use these to save time and energy developing personalized writing prompts, creating rubrics, drafting classroom policies, designing customized educational content, planning classroom and school events, and differentiating lessons.
She emphasized that problems with student engagement contribute heavily to teacher burnout, and the ability of AI tools to personalize learning can help. She gave the example of using MagicSchool AI, with custom images generated by Gemini, to create a personalized visual story for a student having problems.
“When students are off task, when things are getting crazy, when it just feels like everything is happening all at once and we can’t slow down — we’re stressed out, we can’t breathe, we’re trying to just keep our heads above water,” Waybright said. “That’s a huge piece of our burnout, is how can we make our classrooms an inviting, welcoming place where students are engaged in the learning. And this is where technology can come to play a huge part.”
- Book Creator. Waybright cited this as a tool that can increase student engagement, make lessons more accessible and save teachers time in commenting, leaving real-time feedback and differentiating lessons.
“We know with our younger students, it’s difficult to get them onto one tool, let alone five or six,” she said. “Instead of having to create a video, and download it, and then put it into their drive, and share the file settings or put it in something else, you can do it all in one tool.”
Finally, Waybright said there is no cure-all for the problems contributing to teacher burnout, and no technology will be a magic bullet, but educators can do themselves favors by finding efficiencies and opportunities for boundary-setting within the technologies they already have.
“It doesn’t have to be that new high-end tool that has a premium subscription, and we have to spend the money on it,” she said. “Look at what you have within your workflows that could make things easier for a teacher.”
