High-quality early childhood education and care (ECEC) enables families to participate in paid employment and promotes positive outcomes for children. Maintaining a stable ECEC workforce is critical to these endeavours. However, the retention of qualified early childhood educators is a pervasive problem globally. While much has been written about reasons for leaving the sector, there has been less attention to the ‘intention to leave’ stage. This study used a mixed-methods approach to explore how work culture and climate and work-related wellbeing support early childhood professionals’ decisions to stay in or leave the profession, and whether there are significant differences between educators’ and centre directors’ intention to leave. Quantitative findings of survey responses from 713 early childhood professionals suggest that one in three respondents intended to leave the profession, more than half of these within five years. Emotional exhaustion predicted intention to leave in both groups. For centre directors, higher personal accomplishment and older age also predicted higher likelihood of intending to leave. For educators, lower satisfaction with pay and benefits and lower qualification level predicted intention to leave. Qualitative findings highlighted participants’ (n = 97) reasons for intention to leave the sector: feeling undervalued, increased demands with inadequate support, and workforce issues. Understanding these factors may assist in designing interventions to prevent intention turning into a decision to leave, and therefore improve workforce stability. This is especially timely in the Australian context, when attention to supporting the ECEC workforce is high on the political agenda, and real structural and organisational change is possible.

中文翻译：

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与工作相关的福祉以及工作场所文化和氛围对幼儿教育部门离职意向的影响


高质量的幼儿教育和保育 (ECEC) 使家庭能够参与有偿就业，并促进儿童取得积极成果。保持稳定的幼儿保育人员队伍对于这些努力至关重要。然而，留住合格的幼儿教育工作者是全球范围内普遍存在的问题。尽管关于离开该行业的原因已有很多文章，但对“打算离开”阶段的关注却较少。本研究采用混合方法来探讨工作文化和氛围以及与工作相关的福祉如何支持幼儿专业人士留在或离开该行业的决定，以及教育工作者和中心主任的离职意向是否存在显着差异。对 713 名幼儿专业人士的调查回复的定量结果表明，三分之一的受访者打算离开该行业，其中一半以上会在五年内离开。情绪疲惫预示着两组人都有离开的意愿。对于中心主任来说，较高的个人成就和较高的年龄也预示着较高的打算离开的可能性。对于教育工作者来说，对薪酬和福利的满意度较低以及资格水平较低预示着他们有离开的意愿。定性调查结果强调了参与者（n = 97）打算离开该行业的原因：感觉被低估、支持不足而需求增加以及劳动力问题。了解这些因素可能有助于设计干预措施，以防止意图转变为离职决定，从而提高劳动力稳定性。这在澳大利亚背景下尤其及时，因为支持幼儿保育劳动力已成为政治议程的重要议题，并且真正的结构和组织变革是可能的。