An interdisciplinary research team at Georgia Southern University has identified striking patterns in suicides among U.S. K-12 educators, revealing that suicide claims more than 49,000 lives annually in the country and over 700,000 globally, according to the National Institutes of Health.
The study examined 1,548 primary and secondary school educators who died by suicide between 2018 and 2021, using the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s National Violent Death Reporting System. Researchers analyzed sex, age, race, marital status, injury time, injury date, and weapon type for each case. White males, those over age 60, and those who had never been married appeared most frequently in the dataset. Notably, suicides among educators were much more likely to occur during school hours, with injury dates most commonly falling on Mondays.
“The research highlights that anticipatory stress, often dismissed as simply ‘part of the job,’ may have serious consequences,” explained lead author Ed Mondor, associate professor of biology at Georgia Southern. “At the institutional level, it emphasizes the importance of proactive mental health resources and workload policies that acknowledge the emotional demands of teaching.”
The research brought together eight faculty members spanning multiple disciplines, including forensic science, public health, and public policy, across four university colleges. Their work was published in the October 2025 edition of Psychology in the Schools. The team views this publication as a first step toward deeper understanding. According to co-author Leanne Confer, another manuscript is currently under review that takes a closer look at educators noted as having a “job-related problem” prior to their suicide. “We want to further explore how the occupation may contribute to these events,” she explained.
This article is an AI-assisted summary. All facts and figures are drawn from the original report: https://www.georgiasouthern.edu/2026/06/09/interdisciplinary-research-at-georgia-southern-shows-striking-trends-in-suicide-risk-among-educators