Saxony examines working hours: teachers are constantly overloaded!

Saxony examines working hours: teachers are constantly overloaded!

The Saxon State Ministry for Culture (SMK) has published the results of a comprehensive study of working hours among teachers and school management. This survey, which was commissioned by Prognos AG in spring 2024, included the participation of 3,772 teachers and 386 school principals. The aim of this study was clear: to create a reliable data basis in order to ensure the provision and quality of teaching in the long term. Education Minister Conrad Clemens highlights the depth of detail of the investigation and announces the introduction of voluntary working time accounts in order to offer teachers more flexibility.

It is particularly exciting to look at the actual working hours of the teachers. The results show that full-time teachers worked 0.6% less than planned on average each year. However, the situation is different for part-time teachers: they worked an average of 5.8% more than expected. School administrators even exceeded their target by 7.8%, which means an additional working time of around 2.6 hours per week. Incidentally, it was found that stress increased over the course of the school year before decreasing again with the summer holidays. A common stress factor was the high level of organizational demands.

Data collection details

Participation in the study was mandatory and data was collected using a web-based time recording tool. In this context, subjective feelings of stress were also recorded at various times during the school year. More than 69% of full-time teachers and nearly 75% of part-time teachers worked more than their target hours in school weeks, while principals worked an average of 45 hours or more. It is particularly revealing that a good half of the school management's working time was spent on coordination and leadership. Younger and less experienced school leaders also tended to show higher actual-target differences.

The survey is part of a larger trend that is bringing the challenges of the teaching profession into focus. It makes a significant difference whether you teach in primary school or in high school, as primary school teachers invest more time in teaching, while high school teachers invest more in corrections.

Where is the journey going?

With the data collected, a committee of experts will now evaluate the results and develop recommendations. The long-term goal is to give teachers the opportunity to organize their working hours more flexibly while at the same time ensuring the quality of teaching. The approach of introducing voluntary working time accounts shows that the SMK wants to respond to the needs of teachers. The questions that arise are: Will this ease the burden on teachers' everyday work? Can teaching provision actually be improved?

Overall, it can be said that the study is an important step in the right direction to create a transparent and sustainable career design for teachers. Now it remains to be seen what specific measures will be derived from the results and how the framework conditions for teachers in Saxony will develop.

For further information about working time investigations, please click here: diesachsen.de, bildung.sachsen.de and smk.sachsen.de.