Teacher Stress on a Sample of Moroccan Educators

Abstract

Life is stressful, and it is experienced through many daily realms: families, friendships, school, and work. Due to the commonality of stress as a theme, many professionals have studied it. Specifically, certain researchers have focused their attention on stress in the education profession. These studies indicate that students, work resources, and school organizations seem to be major contributors within teacher stress. This project looks at the universalities of stress for educators. To do so, this paper looks at a particular population of eight teachers in Morocco via a qualitative survey addressing the following questions: “To what extent do Moroccan educators feel overwhelmed with stress? What makes Moroccan educators stressed?”, “To what extent do Moroccan teachers leave their profession because of teacher stress? What effect does stress have on Moroccan teachers?”, and “To what extent do Moroccan’s utilize coping mechanisms to handle teacher stress? What makes Moroccan educators stressed?”. The respondents indicated that they are stressed through their education profession, to the point that some are considering leaving their career. The participants suggest that the factors that cause them stress are the size of the school, the lack of administration, the style of the school, the location of the school, the students, and the parents. In order to manage their stress, the respondents ranked their coping strategies. The implications of this study invite conversations about the potential of universality of stress, the potential experiences of stress, and possibilities for managing professional stress in education.