An educationalist retired? (4)

I believe the answer is:

abed

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'retired?' is the definition.
(I've seen this before)

'an educationalist' is the wordplay.
'an' becomes 'a'.
'educationalist' becomes 'bed' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'a'+'bed'='ABED'

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(Other definitions for abed that I've seen before include "Not yet up (archaic)" , "Retired for the night" , "at rest" , "sleeping? Apparently" , "Not yet risen" .)

I've seen this clue in The Times.

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