Compassion Fatigue: The Experiences of Teachers Working with Students with Exceptionalities

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to explore the social-emotional experience of teachers working with students with exceptionalities in the general education classroom. Individual interviews were conducted with five participants with in-service teaching experience. While these teachers highlighted experiencing burnout, the breadth and depth of their experiences with respect to psychological distress were more profoundly situated within compassion fatigue. Considering the root of burnout as being related to workload conditions and that of compassion fatigue being rooted in social-emotional relationships with students, it is possible that compassion fatigue and burnout emerge along parallel trajectories of psychological distress in teachers.