The teachers who leave: Teacher attrition in Burkina Faso

Abstract

High teacher attrition affects education systems through direct costs in replacing teachers who left the service, and indirect costs in classroom disruption and loss in experience. Efforts to address teacher shortage must be informed by which teachers leave and why. Using administrative data from Burkina Faso, we aimed to analyze the demographic and geographic correlates of teacher turnover. We find that early career teachers, female teachers, and teachers with tertiary education, are more likely to attrite. Teachers who hold higher positions—such as school principals—have better retention rates. In terms of school-level attrition, rural and remote schools tend to lose teachers to other schools whereas schools in urban or more developed regions are more likely to lose teachers to options outside of the teacher workforce. Finally, we discuss policy options in improving teacher retention given these findings.