Reply to how many hours a week do you put in as a teacher?

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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]I'm the OP.  I teach in IL.  I have a low salary for someone with my experience and educational level.  I should really be close to 90K at this point.  Unfortunately, when one changes districts a few times over their career, they do not take all their "years" with them.  So, while I have 25 years in, I am only paid as if I have 7 years in.  Again, though, this is not really about the money.  It is about the time.  I love my students and love my work, it is just too much of it.  And I have children of my own and a spouse who I love.  I leave the house at 6 a.m. and don't arrive home until 5 or later each night.  And I'm doing so much work at home and on the weekends.  I brought up my pay because the people I know who are working the hours I work are all making at least double what I make.  It is somewhat comforting to hear that many others making comparable pay to me also have to put in long hours.   But in the long run, I'm still not there enough for my kids and I find this does not gel with my moral code around mothering.  I'd give anything to be able to teach half time.  We just can't afford it.  [/quote]

It looks like it's both about the money and the time. As a fellow teacher in IL, I'd suggest doing whatever possible to downsize your expenses. On teacher salaries, we managed to pay off our home in 4 years and SAHP too. A key was choosing a home that didn't cost more than 2x HHI.[/quote]

That's good!

How much was the house and your salaries? In Northern VA you wouldn't be able to find a home that's only 2x your HHI. I have 25 years and my DW is only 2 steps behind me. That puts our HHI at ~180k. Even as far up as we are in the scale we wouldn't be able to find a home 2x our HHI.[/quote]

Thank you. The house was 95k and our salaries were combined 47k at the time, due to one of us being in school, then shot up to 95k combined shortly after, so we threw more at the mortgage. The feasibility does depend on where you are, as you note. In Illinois, if you can stay out of Chicago, though, there are a lot of good houses available with a 100k budget. If OP really wants more time, chopping expenses (smaller / cheaper house, used cash cars, etc) could make PT possible. Alternatively, so could dropping all of the ECs she's involved in, but OP's mostly ruled that out in previous posts.[/quote]

Thank you for the additional information!

The PP at 15:50 wrote, "I'd wager most DC/MD/VA teachers are clueless about how good they've got it compared to other teachers elsewhere".  If what you were able to do in IL is representative of much of the country, teachers in DC/MD/VA might not be doing so well.[/quote]

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