As a former special education high school teacher, Ashley Rila, clinical assistant professor of special education in the College of Education and CSSI researcher affiliate, has seen firsthand the challenges that school staff face. She now focuses her research on better understanding them.

Rila studies burnout experiences of school staff, including paraeducators, in Iowa, where critical shortages of these professionals persist. Her research reveals that they are tired and stretched thin, although they continue to care deeply about their work.   

Paraeducators support teachers by helping students with the greatest needs, including disabilities, learning challenges, and emotional behavioral needs. Among all the Iowa school staff she surveyed, they reported the lowest perceived organizational support from school leaders, which may be linked to increased burnout.

“We asked, ‘Do you get the help that you need? Is there someone you can talk to?’” she said. “In extreme cases, some paraeducators are reporting that they have to go to the ER because they're getting attacked, or they have to go to counseling because they have PTSD due to the behaviors they're dealing with on a daily basis.”

Last summer, Rila participated in CSSI’s Summer Researcher-in-Residence program, which gave her dedicated time and space to develop her manuscript on burnout among paraeducators. She is currently scaling her survey nationally to capture burnout trends of paraeducators in other states.

Identifying burnout among school mental health providers   

In her earlier work, Rila, an affiliated faculty member of the UI Scanlan Center for School Mental Health, surveyed 120 school mental health providers, including counselors, school psychologists, and social workers. The study, conducted in 2024, found that 64.2% reported high levels of emotional exhaustion.

Although most of Iowa’s school mental health providers are clinically burned out, Rila said, there is a glimmer of hope: Most reported high (64.2%) or moderate (25%) coping abilities. And more than half (55%) maintained a sense of high personal accomplishment. 

“Emotional exhaustion means you're getting drained from your work. You may have a hard time waking up and coming into work,” Rila said. “Whereas personal accomplishment means you believe you're doing something good with your work.”

Providers with higher perceived organizational support reported less burnout, as did those with higher job satisfaction.

Most counties in Iowa don't have adequate mental health services, Rila said. 

“We're basically in a mental health desert,” she said. “So, when an educator needs to talk to someone, or see a doctor, it can be difficult to find someone in their community. And if they’re not mentally well, they may not be implementing best practices in classrooms.”

A need for more paraeducator training

Most paraeducators are undertrained. Although they receive the least training, Rila said, they often work with students who have the greatest needs. Often paraeducators are only required to have a high school diploma. 

“The special education teacher is the case manager - they're developing the plan and the paraeducator implements it,” she said. “But paraeducators don't necessarily know what the best practices are for teaching, interacting, or deescalating.”

Rila said she appreciated having a quiet, dedicated space at CSSI to advance her paraeducator burnout research through CSSI’s Summer Researcher-in-Residence program. 

“I also really appreciated the community aspect that was encouraged. Despite only being there for a limited time, they made sure to include us in the breakfasts and meetings,” she said.

Rila also studies behavioral interventions for K12 students with emotional behavioral disorders (EBDs), such as anxiety, depression, and oppositional defiance disorder.

“We need to figure out for whom and in what contexts our practices are effective,” she said. “When we've identified an evidence-based practice, if it's not targeting a specific population or behavior, then we shouldn't assume that it will work.”