Staff turnover rate at group homes
by Beth
Our 23-year-old son lives in a group home. Gus is healthy and well taken care of. His life doesn’t change much, and stability is good for him. And for us, too.
When friends ask how Gus is doing, I give them my pat answer, tell them he’s fine. Really, the only thing we can imagine changing in Gus’ life from here on out is the staff at his group home. Working at a group home is such hard work, usually the turnover is high. “So at least there’s one good thing about the recession,” I say. “There aren’t many other jobs available, so for a long time now no one on staff has quit.”
Funny, the things we say sometimes without really knowing they’re true. I mean, I know the staff at the group home hasn’t turned over much the past two years. But is the turnover rate genearlly high in group homes? Or has that just been our experience where Gus lives?
Turns out hard statistics on this are difficult to come by. From a web site called SparkAction:
Though little studied and rarely acknowledged publicly, high staff turnover plagues the entire children and youth out-of-home care industry — and much of the developmental services field as well. The reasons vary from locale to locale, but experts in the field say the primary ones are: low pay, long hours, absence of career ladders and lack of pre-service and in-service training and skills to deal with sometimes difficult young people.
An article I found in the Salem Statesman Journal said the staff turnover rates in Oregon group homes average about 85 percent a year.
Studies in other states have found annual turnover rates ranging from 57 percent to more than 100 percent.
Unfortunately, the story did not quote a source for those numbers. The most definitive study I could find comes from Cheryl A. Larson, the co-author of a book called Staff Recruitment, Retention, & Training Strategies For Community Human Services Organizations. Larson’s dissertation looked at turnover in small group home settings and revealed an annual turnover rate of almost 50%. The SparkAction web site quotes Dr. Larson:
“Even more challenging, of direct support workers who left during the previous 12 months, 41 percent had left before finishing six months on the job, and another 25 percent left before finishing 12 months on the job,” she said.
So I guess it’s not just Gus’ group home that had always experienced a high turnover rate. I wonder, though, if the recession is having the same effect on other group homes that it seems to be having where Gus lives. Whatever the reason, we are grateful for the hardworking an dedicated staff there. A Godsend.
August 10th, 2010 at 8:37 pm
I used to work at a group home for the brain injured and devlopmentally delayed. Some of the clients that were there had been charged with rape or aggravated assault. One of the clients had a normal intelligence and he would constantly hit on the female staff and even accused one of indecent liberties with him. I don’t understand why he was even there. He was placed ina home with 2 people that had the mental age of about 6. He finally got kicked out of the program after he assaulted a couple of the other clients. I’d say the turnover was at least 80%. I eventually left because I couldn’t deal with all the BS. Everytime a client exhibited a behavior problem that got out of control it was “all your fault” according to the management.
July 23rd, 2010 at 1:47 am
I was in a residential placement, and the turn over rate for my dorm was the lowest in the building. Meaning, only half my dorm staff left in the 12 months I was there. Other dorms, especially dorms that housed boys (more violence, generally) had very high turnover rates, although I don’t know the details because I didn’t know their staff well. The other ‘teen girls’ dorm, next door, had their entire staff turn over during maybe a 3 month period, fortunately it coincided with most of their students being discharged. I graduated in 2005 and to the best of my knowledge the only staff that are still there that I actually worked with are senior staff members.
It’s pretty serious. I mean, imagine you had a family, and every 6 to 12 months one of those members of your family left, not to be heard from again, and was replaced by a stranger. Often a stranger who has no clue what they’re doing. It’d be hard for typical people to handle.