It’s that time of year when people resolve to be healthier, happier, and more productive. Nearly 50% of American adults make New Year’s resolutions, according to a 2026 nationwide poll, and about half of resolution makers aim to improve physical health. But most struggle to stay committed.
Giving up on resolutions is so common that there’s now an official name for it: Quitter’s Day. It takes place on the second Friday in January. That’s when social fitness platform Strava observed an 80% drop in tracking activity among more than 800 million users. Similarly, a 2023 Forbes Health/One Poll survey of 1,000 adults found that respondents stick to their resolution (most commonly connected to fitness goals) an average of 3.74 months.
For teachers, it may seem the odds of sticking to a fitness resolution are stacked against them. Rigid schedules, chaotic or truncated lunch breaks, and the intense nature of the job make it hard to put personal health first. Yet many teachers get more exercise in a day than they realize—no gym required.
Built-in obstacles: time, energy, structure
The pandemic introduced millions of professional adults to remote or hybrid work, giving many workers more control over their schedules and fewer hours spent commuting. These workers have also reported that they’re more likely to exercise.
Teachers, of course, don’t have this luxury.
Teachers also struggle more than other similarly educated professionals to maintain work-life-boundaries. They are more than three times as likely as other working adults to say their job leaves them too tired for after-work personal activities, according to the 2025 State of the American Teacher survey, which included 1,400 K-12 teachers and more than 500 working adults with similar levels of education. This means that teachers who want to join an exercise class or cook healthy meals may simply lack the energy. Here’s just one example:
“I’m in my second year, and I have gained around 25 pounds since getting hired last year. When I get home, I am drained. I’m like a robot; I drop my stuff, change, and get on the couch with my dog, and my brain goes to mush. I’m just exhausted to the point where the thought of exercising is daunting,” one teacher wrote on Reddit’s teacher channel.
Time pressures during the school day also work against healthy habits. In some states, teachers are not guaranteed “duty-free” lunches, which may force teachers to eat quickly—circumstances that rarely lend themselves to intentional, healthy eating.
That may partly explain the results of a 2020 study in the journal Preventive Medicine Reports that labeled the overall quality of teachers’ diet as “low.” The study, which examined diets of 331 classroom teachers and teaching assistants from 20 schools between 2017 to 2019, found sodium and sugar intake above recommended levels. Educators consumed approximately 14 teaspoons of added sugar daily—more than double the American Heart Association’s 6-teaspoon recommendation. Researchers pointed to sugary school celebrations as a major contributor.
The good news: everyday movement matters
Our society celebrates gym, spin bike, and weight rack workouts, but teachers engage in constant movement throughout the day—just ask kindergarten teachers, who rarely sit down. While most teachers have desks, few stay behind them for long.
EdWeek asked readers on social media: Do you feel you get adequate exercise during the week? Of 1,446 respondents, 70% said they don’t. But one wrote: “20,000 steps running from room to room to teach. Yes. Could barely walk at the end of the day.”
In a nationally representative survey conducted by the EdWeek Research Center in the fall of 2024, nearly two-thirds of teachers and administrators said they use digital fitness trackers to measure daily steps. On average, educators reported logging more than 8,500 steps, about 1.6 miles, daily.
Erin McKee, principal at Cougar Mountain Middle School in Issaquah. Wash., prioritizes wellness among her staff and has established “walking challenges” with weekly rankings and prizes—usually in May, months after most resolutions fade.
“During this month, you will see many staff walking the track, opting for stairs over elevators, and encouraging their teammates,” said McKee, who estimates that 90% of the staff, from teachers to cafeteria workers, participate.
All that walking at work, whether out of necessity or friendly competition, pays off, say health experts. Non-exercise activity thermogenesis, the energy expended during activities outside of a structured exercise program, typically plays a bigger role in calorie burning than working out, according to research on the subject.
“Sometimes it’s hard to carve out 30 to 60 minutes of your day to do an exercise routine,” Seth Creasy, an exercise physiologist at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, told NPR. “These little behaviors can accumulate and end up comprising a lot of energy expenditure.”
That’s great news for teachers, especially those who made lofty New Year’s resolutions to work out this year.