Exploring the role of school climate, teacher workload, and job satisfaction in student achievement: insights from PIRLS and TIMSS

Abstract The study investigates how teachers’ working conditions – specifically workload and perceptions of a safe and orderly school climate – relate to teachers’ job satisfaction and student achievement in Swedish Grade 4 classrooms. Drawing on data from two international large-scale assessments, PIRLS (2016 and 2021) and TIMSS (2019 and 2023), the study applies parallel mediation structural equation modelling to investigate whether changes in working conditions mediate changes in teacher job