EFL teachers' wellbeing in the context of disaster: Building back better

How can a teacher continue teaching when their city lies in ruins, their students grieve in silence, and they struggle to endure? In disaster-stricken contexts, teachers assume roles beyond merely transmitting knowledge: they provide emotional support, serve as anchors for community recovery, and often act as silent witnesses to profound suffering. With natural disasters occurring more frequently and with greater severity worldwide, education systems cannot limit their focus to infrastructure and curriculum alone; they must also attend to teachers' psychological resilience and professional continuity. In this sense, teacher well-being represents both a moral imperative and a strategic priority. This doctoral dissertation examines the well-being of English language teachers working in public schools in Hatay, Türkiye, in the aftermath of the devastating 2023 earthquakes. The focus on English teachers is deliberate, as language education carries a distinctive pedagogical nature. Language classes often involve real-life communication, emotional expression, and meaningful content, creating uniquely restorative spaces for students in times of trauma. In this regard, English teachers serve not only as academic guides but also as role models of resilience and sources of emotional support. The study analyses how teachers conceptualise their well-being after a large-scale disaster, which individual, institutional, and societal factors support or hinder their well-being, and how participation in the research process influences teachers' understanding of their well-being, and in what ways teachers' experiences can inform the development of trauma-sensitive educational policies and practices. Adopting a mixed-methods design, the research gathered quantitative data from 191 teachers through standardised scales and qualitative data from 19 teachers via semi-structured interviews. Findings indicate that teachers experienced considerable cognitive, emotional, and professional challenges in the aftermath of the disaster, yet they also developed transformative coping strategies and new forms of resilience. The qualitative analysis revealed four central themes: (1) collegial solidarity and peer support as a collective source of recovery, (2) reciprocal healing between students and teachers, with children's resilience inspiring renewed motivation among teachers, (3) a natural shift toward trauma-responsive pedagogy, as teachers reduced academic load and prioritized empathy, play, and flexibility, and (4) the expansion of teachers' roles beyond the classroom, where they became crucial figures of support for families and communities. The results underscore the importance of robust social support networks, flexible educational policies, and teacher-centred well-being initiatives for sustaining the profession in times of crisis. While grounded in the specific context of Hatay, the findings have broader implications for educational contexts facing natural disasters, wars, or other large-scale emergencies. Ultimately, by offering applied, policy-relevant, and context-sensitive insights, this dissertation, which advocates for an integrated and preventive approach to teacher support, contributes to the literature on teacher well-being and trauma-informed pedagogy and advocates for educational systems that are better prepared to withstand crises. Keywords: Teacher well-being, English language teachers, disaster-responsive education, trauma-informed pedagogy, resilience.