teachers, i've never met another profession that complained as much as you all do. . .seriously. . . . .

To 23.49. Montessori teacher in first post of thread here! Just wanted to say thank you!

Anonymous wrote:teachers, et al: please explain to us who held guns to your heads and forced you to choose your profession and/or is inhibiting you from choosing one which would be a better fit.

I haven't read many posts here with teachers complaining about their line of work. Most seem positive about it. What it's mostly been about is non-teachers talking about their lack of vacation time.

Anonymous wrote:Private. Montessori teacher. BS/MA/Montessori certificate. 16 years experience. $49 thousand

As the parent of a Montessori child, I'm so sorry to hear this; I would hope that given your experience, you would make $100,000-120,00

I'm 42 years old and have never had more than 2 weeks off in a row in my life. I've had law jobs that probably had 3-4 weeks of vacation a year, but nobody took that much. 3 weeks off in a row yearly, plus all the other holidays, is worth at least 20K to me annually.

teachers, et al: please explain to us who held guns to your heads and forced you to choose your profession and/or is inhibiting you from choosing one which would be a better fit.

Yeah, and anyone who thinks $50k is fabulous in this area - even working 10 months is nuts. It's a better salary than many earn, but it will be very challenging to acquire the trappings of the middle class (house, car, vacations out of town, savings). And that's with a M Ed!

And lest we forget, these folks work a LOT of hours during those ten months to teach your children something other than how to play the Wii or Xbox.

Anonymous wrote:

Nonetheless, teachers do not work the full 12 months. Some of us work 12 months with 2 weeks of vacation time. Even if you work 10 months, you have the option of working those additional 9 weeks. You have the option of taking work such as summer camp, special ed, summer school, and other programs that will earn you additional income. Or even work outside of education. Most of us have our salary and the only way to make additional income is to work evenings or weekends. So, if you opt to do continuing ed or other programs that train you, that is your choice. However, you do have the choice to take another job for 9-10 weeks and earn income on top of your teacher salary. While the 12/10 factor may not be accurate since your interim job probably does not pay as much as your regular salary, your salary is still only a portion of your earning potential as a teacher. That is the point.

Very few professionals work twelve months. PP lawyer here w/31 days of PTO, that's six weeks off. I have never had only two weeks of paid time off in any professional job I've ever worked (and I'm 51yo and went to law school after working for years).

Moreover, while teachers have the option to take another job for 9 or 10 weeks, whatever job you can get for that filler-time doesn't pay much. Summer camp, summer school - piddly pay. That's a fact.

And if you did work all those other weeks, that would leave you with little vacation to replenish your reserves.

PP you quoted. Actually, I've worked in IT for 24 years. Especially in federal contracting, but even before then in private. Each of my 5 employers has started employees at 2 weeks vacation for 1 or 2 years. Then you go up to 3 weeks of vacation until about 5 years, then you got 4 weeks between 5-10 years. My current employer is it 2 weeks for the first year, 3 weeks for 1+ to 10 years and 4 weeks for 10+ years. And this includes all staff for a roughly 500 employee company, so that's IT, admin, corporate management, etc. One of my employers was a big defense industry company (one was over 65K employees) and it was pretty comparable there, too. My father worked for a major engineering corporation (over 15K employees) for 34 years and it was pretty similar there.

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Anonymous wrote:$50k is nice, but it's hard to support a family in this area without another income. It's ridiculous.

The salary is a bit misleading because of working 9 months. take the salary divide by nine then times 12 is the real salary, that ls not including the gold plated health and ension benifits.

Where do people come up with nine months? Around here teachers work through most of June and go back in September which leaves July and August when most teachers I know are taking continuing ed classes or material for the next year.

So true. I am out of my classroom around June 20 and back in around Aug 10. School in the District doesn't start after labor day. It usually starts around Aug 25. I work at camp in the summer. Take about three weeks off in July to be with my family at our lake cottage in upstate NY to rest and regain my sanity so I can start all over again. I teach Pre-K. It is physically and emotionally tiring, but I pretty much love it. Can't imagine being in a desk job.

I have tons of respect for teachers and think they are underpaid, undervalued etc but you know 3 weeks of straight vacation isn't possible in most other jobs, right? What an incredible perk!

Yes, its a good "perk" but remember that it is unpaid and not optional 'leave'. When I was single and teaching, I thoroughly enjoyed my summers off. But now that I have more financial responsibilities, I can't afford to take 3 weeks 'off' anymore (I have a lower paying, but still paying, summer job, at least when I'm not attending a summer training). And other jobs have pretty good 'perks', too, the kind that teachers will never see. My dh has access to a gym (!) and BONUS: he can usually go to the bathroom when he feels the need. Choose your juice, choose your poison.

Anonymous wrote:I'm a lawyer and work my tail off and don't make much more. Yet not one feels sorry for us.

Are you in a classroom with children all day? I think not.

teachers always act poor to hide their benefits, 9 month work year and pensions.

$53k, 13 yrs plus college level teaching during grad school, PhD. Work other job to make ends meet so end up working about double the hours during the school year.

Anonymous wrote:Teachers, lots of other jobs out there in OfficeWorld a waitin' for you if you're not happy with what you've got. Just sayin'.

Did any teacher say they weren't happy?

Teachers, lots of other jobs out there in OfficeWorld a waitin' for you if you're not happy with what you've got. Just sayin'.

95K + bonus: 10yrs in DCPS w/Ph.D. While I wasn't a huge fan of Rhee, at least she really boosted our salaries. I started out making around 35K. We definitely work hard for it, but as a PP said, i couldn't imagine doing anything else. And 9 weeks vacation to spend with my own kids is the best!