SINGAPORE: Teachers in Singapore worked longer hours and were more likely to experience a lot of stress compared to the OECD average, a study found.
The OECD Teaching and Learning International Survey, which is done every five years, is the largest international survey of teachers and principals.
In 2024, 55 education systems were surveyed, including 3,500 lower secondary teachers across all 145 public secondary schools and 10 randomly selected private secondary schools in Singapore. Singapore also took part in the 2013 and 2018 editions.
Full-time teachers in Singapore reported that they worked a total of 47.3 hours a week, above the OECD average of 41 hours. This was the same as when the survey was last conducted in 2018, the report showed.
The survey also found that 27 per cent of teachers in Singapore experienced “a lot” of stress in their work, higher than the OECD average of 19 per cent. This figure increased by 4 percentage points from 2018.
Teachers under 30 were more likely to report feeling “a lot” of stress compared to those aged 50 and above, the results showed.
TIME SPENT ON WORK
Of the teachers surveyed, 10 per cent said their job had “a lot” of negative impact on their mental health, which is similar to the overall average.
