ORIGINAL PAPER A Non-Randomised Feasibility Trial Assessing the Efficacy of a Mindfulness-Based Intervention for Teachers to Reduce Stress and Improve Well-Being Shadi Beshai 1 & Lindi McAlpine 2 & Katherine Weare 3 & Willem Kuyken 4 # Springer Science+Business Media New York 2015 Abstract Teacher stress is a serious and endemic concern. Mindfulness-based interventions show promise in reducing stress and increasing well-being by cultivating mindfulness and self-compassion. This feasibility trial evaluated a mindfulness-based programme customised for teachers. A sample of 89 secondary school teachers and staff were recruit- ed and self-selected into the intervention (n =49) or compari- son (n =40) conditions. Participants were asked to complete self-reports which measured stress (PSS), well-being (WEMWBS), mindfulness (FFMQ), and self-compassion (SCS; Kindness and Self-Judgement) at baseline and after the completion of the intervention. Results revealed that indi- viduals in the intervention condition reported significant re- ductions in stress, and significant increases in well-being post- intervention in comparison to their counterparts in the com- parison group. There was an observed large effect (η p 2 >.14) for the intervention on all outcome measures, an effect that was maintained when controlling for baseline differences be- tween the intervention and comparison groups. Furthermore, the majority (95 %) of teachers who attended the course found it to be acceptable. These results indicate that a customised mindfulness-based programme for teachers is a promising approach to reducing stress and increasing well-being, mind- fulness, and self-compassion among secondary school teachers. However, the results of the current study are prelim- inary and the next phase of work will involve extending to a larger scale randomised controlled trial. Keywords Feasibility trial . Mindfulness . Teachers . Stress . Well-being Introduction Schools play a vital role in shaping childhood and adolescent development and have great potential to promote health, includ- ing mental health (Eccles et al. 1993; Weare 2000; Weare and Markham 2005). Within the school system, teachers are arguably the most important agents for the cultivation and promotion of health. Teachers are an important element in students’ lives, with evidence pointing to teacher well-being as indirectly but signif- icantly affecting students’ social and emotional health and scho- lastic performance (Malmberg and Hagger 2009). However, work-related stress among teachers is a serious and endemic problem, and this stress has negative implications on their health and effectiveness (Pithers and Fogarty 1995). Evidence suggests that stress among teachers is often associated with turnover and absenteeism from work, which are believed to be rising with the increasing demands and pressure placed upon teachers (Aud et al. 2011; Montgomery and Rupp 2005). For instance, Sheffield et al. (1994) found that job stress among teachers was correlated with short-term sick leave, but also predictive of other measures of psychological well-being. Mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have shown promise in alleviating stress and promoting well-being (Khoury et al. 2013). A number of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) show moderate effects for mindfulness-based * Willem Kuyken willem.kuyken@psych.ox.ac.uk 1 Department of Psychology, University of Regina, 3737 Wascana Parkway, Regina, SK S4S0A2, Canada 2 Psychology; College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QG, UK 3 Southampton Education School, University of Southampton, University Rd, Southampton S017 1BJ, UK 4 Department of Psychiatry, University of Oxford, Warneford Hospital, Oxford 0X3 7JX, UK Mindfulness DOI 10.1007/s12671-015-0436-1