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For the past six years, the Charles Butt Foundation has conducted a yearly teacher poll on Texas educators to learn about their experience within public education. This year the poll is titled, “The 2025 Texas Teacher Poll: Craft, Care, and A Call to Action.”
“We did this [the teacher poll] to amplify teacher voices across the state,” Charles Butt Foundation President Shari Albright said. “And to highlight our shared responsibility to support them in this essential work."
A key finding from the poll is that about 66% of Texas teachers are considering leaving their jobs — a drop from last year’s 78%. The driving factors include stress, poor pay and benefits, along with excessive workloads and feeling undervalued.
The poll found multiple factors that would help retain them.
“In our survey, Texas teachers responded that the number one factor cited by 94% of teachers is a significant salary increase, 78% cite additional support from campus administrators, and 73% say smaller class sizes,” Senior Program Director of Data Insights Kurt Lockhart shared at the 2025 Texas teacher poll launch webinar.
The report also found that over 70% of those surveyed emphasize job stability and the ability to make a difference as a benefit in their career. Similarly, around 70% surveyed said they are in need of additional support staff for administrative tasks, as well as with students who experience learning gaps and behavioral challenges.
“Over half of Texas teachers said professional development should focus more on addressing learning gaps and supporting students in special populations,” Senior Research Associate Melissa Garza said. “About three quarters or more of Texas teachers want to spend less time on administrative tasks and administering standardized tests.”
High teacher turnover matters because research shows that students learn better when they're taught by an experienced teacher.
To close the webinar, Lockhart quoted a call to action made by an anonymous elementary school teacher from central Texas.
“There is a deficit mentality that the problem is the teacher who needs more training, rather than addressing the systemic issues facing education,” Lockhart said.
To represent the broad group of 400,000 educators in Texas, the foundation partnered with Langer Research Associates to randomly recruit 1,183 participants. They used a list of emails from the Texas Education Agency database and publicly available data. The survey was conducted this spring, between March third and June second. To find the full Teacher Poll report visit the Charles Butt Foundation website.
Editor’s note: The Charles Butt Foundation was a contributor to TPR’s 2017 capital campaign.
