Stress and overwork are driving hundreds of secondary school teachers to quit or take leave, says their union.
A survey of nearly 4900 of the country's 16,000 teachers found 153 had decided to leave this year because of stress, 63 had already left and 237 had taken stress-related sickleave.
The smaller the school and the poorer the community, the more the teachers wanted to leave or were calling in sick.
The Post Primary Teachers Association, which carried out the survey in July and August, said the results suggested that up to 457 teachers, or 3 per cent, would quit by the end of the year, and at least 1000 would take sick leave for stress.
The Ministry of Education disputes the findings.
The national manager of Teach NZ, Irene Lynch, said two staff members visiting schools throughout New Zealand were not getting feedback that would support the findings.
"The ministry has no evidence to support the PPTA claim, and there is no evidence the loss rates are any higher."
The PPTA president, Graeme Macann, said the figure might not seem high, but there was already expected to be a teacher shortage of 6 per cent next year as a population boom moved on to secondary schools.
Teaching had become more difficult, demanding and dangerous in the past five to 10 years, and the association had received a high number of calls during the second-term break from stressed-out teachers seeking advice on taking sick leave or resigning.
"Increasing numbers of our new, bright, enthusiastic teachers are looking at their peers in other sectors and consequently opting for a better-paid job with most evenings and weekends free.
"Teaching needs to become a more attractive profession that top people are queuing up to join, rather than leave."
The president of the School Trustees Association, Owen Edgerton, said teaching was becoming more challenging as student behaviour worsened, and teachers were often not given enough support.
"Some people work long hours and really hard, while others could be doing more to share the workload."
The number leaving was a concern, he said, but it might be comparable with other professions.
