Are my parents right about teaching?

Parents Forum
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<p>I'm a math/cs major at a top-25 university, recently, I was talking to my parents about possible careers. I definitely want to try go to grad school and try to get a PhD but I've heard so many horror stories about getting jobs and how hard it is to even get into PhD programs that I told my mom that I might want to become a high school math teacher. Math education is something I really care about and I feel like I could be pretty helpful since I have a good math background (something most of my high school math teachers didn't have). And I also keep reading that high school math teachers are in great demand.</p>

<p>Well, to put it lightly, my parents were not very happy when I told them this. My mom started screaming about how I should have just gone to the state flagship or something if I just wanted to be a teacher, that I didn't deserve to be at the college I'm at now. She also said that students wouldn't respect me and that I would be much better off getting another job and just being a tutor. My dad's a professor, but teaches a lot of remedial classes, and he said that he felt like he was of no significance in his students lives. Then he told me a story about how one of his students complained about his grade even though he never showed up to class, and used that as an example of why I shouldn't go into teaching. But basically this kept going for like a few hours, with them complaining about how I'm wasting their money, that they made a mistake by sending me to this school, that I'd be poor for the rest of my life, etc.</p>

<p>Are my parents right about this? I'm not really sure how to react.</p>

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<p>If money is the most important thing in your life, do not become a teacher.</p>

<p>If serving your fellow man is the most important thing in your life, then teaching is one of the most honorable and useful ways to lead a fulfilling life - IF you’re good at it, and IF you’re not doing it just because your career alternative is working the checkout line at Target. I can’t imagine that choice would apply to a math/CS major at a top university.</p>

<p>Teaching, like every other job on the planet, has its downsides, and it sounds like your father has shared some of them with you. But there are upsides, too. I can’t believe that any good teacher really believes “he was of no significance in his students lives” - perhaps your dad was exaggerating to make a point. </p>

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<p>It sounds like your parents’ values are based on money. That doesn’t mean yours must be.</p>

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<p>Time not to listen to the parents. Find out what YOU want–not them. All parents have their own issues.</p>

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<p>You could take the path of many of my peers; a four year degree in math or computer science, a career in industry, and getting a masters in education in order to teach at the public school level at a later date. I think you can teach at private schools without a degree in education. I’m sure someone else on this site can verify this! Most of our high school staff members have stellar backgrounds; 30+ ACT’s, multiple masters degrees, Ivy educations, and patents. None of us make over $60,000.</p>

<p>Teaching, because of its less than desirable salary is perceived as a vocation. I think every career path can become a vocation. It all depends on how you address this issue.</p>

<p>Good luck! You will be OK. Contemplate.</p>

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<p>By the time you are working on your PhD and looking for subsequent jobs, you will no longer (hopefully) be a dependent of your parents and will be making your own decisions.</p>

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<p>there is a valid point to be made about the wisdom of paying top dollar for your degree if your future career path is not very lucrative, but mother’s reaction is entirely inappropriate. Their reaction was demeaning towards you and betrayed the fact that they seemingly care more about your prestige as a professional than your happiness and ambitions as a person. If this is unlikely to ever change, you should feel free to never speak to them about this matter again.</p>

<p>Two of my math teachers in HS were MIT graduates. The first, which I had in freshman year, put me through the toughest math course I had ever taken and gave me a very, very solid foundation in the skills I would need for higher math. Her husband, who left his cushy job at a defence contractor to become a stay-at-home dad, and then went back to teaching, made calculus seem easy to me in junior year. The fact that these two individuals could be making cool six figures in the private sector, decided instead to teach advanced HS math and physics (at a public HS) and be exceptionally dedicated parents was not lost on their students. They’ve earned countless students’ respect, admiration, and even juvenile affections.</p>

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<p>Another option is to do as AHSTeacher suggests only teach at your local community college at night. They offer a wide range of classes and often do not require a master’s or certification. It is particularly difficult to get people to teach the remedial math.</p>

<p>Some private high schools do not require certification. So that would be an option as well. Private schools are often close communities and are nice places to work–though not get rich.</p>

<p>Teaching can be a rewarding career, but can be rather thankless. I think that our country is realizing that we are behind in math and science and there are places that are really putting some money into improving programs. </p>

<p>I wish you luck.</p>

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<p>If you are a math major at a top-25 university, and you have an interest in teaching high school or middle school math, there are myriad programs that will help you try that out without having to get a teaching degree first. The most famous is Teach For America, and also the Teaching Fellows program, but there are lots more, and some districts do their own recruiting. Math majors are in enormous demand. (The son of friends, a math major at Amherst, was wined and dined by the Louisville KY school district.) You will do the work to earn your teaching credentials while you teach.</p>

<p>It is hard, hard work, and there’s no guarantee you will like it. Some people do, some don’t. If you don’t like it, it’s more than easy to get out while you are young, and go to graduate school (where something like TFA is an accepted, even desirable credential) or get the kind of job you would have gotten if you hadn’t gone into teaching.</p>

<p>It’s not a poverty job, for someone coming right out of college. It’s not Wall Street, either, but thanks to those reviled teachers’ unions beginning teachers get more than a living wage, and great benefits, and school districts can’t pay carpetbaggers like you less than they would pay a “real” teacher. In competitive suburban areas – which won’t be where you start out teaching – salaries for experienced teachers go well into the low six figures, for nine months of work. That’s not getting rich, but it’s far from being poor.</p>

<p>What’s more, teaching can lead to things other than more teaching – school administration, educational policy and reform, politics. One of the most interesting, successful design stores in my city was started by a pair of teachers who began to import carpets from central Asia where they visited in their vacations. I know of several teachers in Congress and in government. One teacher I know started a test-prep business that earned her hundreds of thousands of dollars a year before she decided she didn’t want the stress, sold it, and went back to regular teaching.</p>

<p>And it is really noble, important work. If you want to try it, you ought to give it a go.</p>

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<p>You have two concerns: 1.Your parents anger related to the money and how they express it, 2.The wisdom of pursuing teaching as a career, for multiple reasons, including the salary.</p>

<p>If it was one of my kids, who are attending very expensive private schools, and they wanted to be a teacher, I would probably react as your parents did. You are talking about a lot of money, and if your parents aren’t wealthy and paying full freight, they most likely feel that they have thrown away money for which they worked very hard.</p>

<p>Teachers are being laid off all over the place and their salaries are not that great until the have worked for many years. I know one boy with two Physics degrees from a top school who was planning to be a teacher from the start. He teaches high school now, two years post grad, and makes in the mid 60’s in a very expensive school district.</p>

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<p>It is definitely true that high school teacher salaries are low - particularly in STEM fields. There is a shortage of math teachers because folks with math degrees can get a lot more pay elsewhere. Money is definitely not everything, but if you are going to come out of school with a lot of debt, you are looking at a long , hard slog.</p>

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<p>^ @1986, if you think that money should be the driving force in your kid’s life, then your position makes a lot of sense.</p>

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<p>Read Jonathan Kozol and Frank Stepnowski and Bel Kaufman, and Conroy’s “The Water is Wide” ( the latter is also a film). Oh, and “Mr. Chips” (read the book, or watch the B&W film) If you fall in love with teaching, then sit down and make a budget, assuming a starting salary of around 35K rural and 50k urban and be sure to include paying off your loans.
Teaching at a private school has a slightly different set of plus/minus factors - and if you land a slot at a boarding school, you can live there (although that’s not often a posting for a new teacher.)</p>

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<p>^^#11 I don’t, but you should be realistic about salary potential and living expenses and employability.</p>

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<p>I know you’re mainly asking about salary, but I just wanted to add a couple of other considerations. </p>

<p>I’d like to point out that there’s a big difference between teaching at the college level (even if it’s remedial math) and at the K-12 level. Each has its own frustrations and rewards (for example, as a high school math teacher, you may have to deal with a lot of helicopter parents, while at the college level, that will be rarer), and you shouldn’t just draw on your dad’s negative view and experience. If you’re really interested, have you considered getting in touch with your former high school math teachers and asking them for their experiences and opinions?</p>

<p>As one parent has already suggested, you might look into TFA after graduation. The bonus is that not only does it provide valuable teaching experience, it is also highly valued by grad schools (and I think many if not most TFA-ers do the program as a break between undergrad and grad school and not with the intention of going into teaching as a career). In the meantime, you can try to get teaching experience on campus. At my school, the math, science, and econ departments hired undergraduates as TAs if they did well in the courses they were TAing for. You may not have a lot of teaching duties, but you will definitely interact with many different kinds of students. In addition, your school probably has volunteer programs that provide educational services like tutoring, SAT prep for low income kids, etc.</p>

<p>I can sympathize with your situation, so I wish you the best of luck in making an informed decision.</p>

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<p>Don’t count on a shortage of math teachers. My kid has applied for well over 100 positions in the state of WI, but there have been 100-200 applications for each one of those positions.</p>

<p>If you want to teach, make sure you have a back-up plan. Or keep the plan for a math degree, and go into teaching through Teach for America (which is also highly competitive) or a similar program for non-ed majors (mostly in southern states).</p>

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<p>The problem with teaching (at the college level) is that you either get a job at some random Directional State U. teaching bored kids bored stuff, or you play the adjunct game and pray you get hired, or you get a job at a good school and have to play the ‘publish or perish’ and ‘funding or perish’ games or else. That’s for college level.</p>

<p>Teaching at the K-12 level is difficult for other reasons, mostly few openings. My district pays top dollar but while we have stellar language and social studies teachers I have been underwhelmed by our math teaching… Most K-12 teachers make good living especially if they get into the coaching etc, plus benefits are usually great, but states are beginning to turn hostile towards teaching so that may be another thing to consider.</p>

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<p>How about teaching the stuff in a way that isn’t boring? </p>

<p>Sent from my SAMSUNG-SGH-I897 using CC App</p>

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<p>Please don’t let kkmama discourage you, if teaching is what you are drawn to. I graduated as an Elementary Ed. Major in early 80’s, in the midst of a horrible economy. Every job opening had over 200 applicants when I was applying. I worked in wonderful places as a result. I taught in a tiny (4 teachers) school in a farming community in Wisconsin as my first job. Not, perhaps what I would have chosen, but what a phenomenal experience! I taught a combined 5th and 6th grade class, a total of 25 students. </p>

<p>And a great math teacher is worth her/his weight in gold, but it isn’t for everyone, so try to gain some experience before you make a decision. Shadowing a middle school or high school algebra I teacher at a less than dream school would give you a feel for “the trenches” of teaching.</p>

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<p>Ultimately you should do what you want to do. You are an adult, and have to take the burden of making choices. I would just recommend two things. </p>

<p>First, don’t take up teaching because it is a noble profession. Don’t take it up because you will be helping people and think it will be rewarding. Don’t take it up as a resume filler for PhD. Take it up only if you really want to do it, and think it will be fun. Otherwise, the burn out potential is huge. This by the way is true for any job. </p>

<p>Second, take a hard look at your financial situation, as teaching won’t pay well now or later. You will have to pay student loans now (unless your parent paid for all of it, in which case I totally understand their perspective). You will have to support a family later. You wouldn’t want to moonlight as a Central Asian carpet importer to make ends meet - after all, you are going into teaching because you love teaching. So, think about that as well.</p>

<p>But if you believe that you will have a blast teaching and would be able to make the ends meet, go for it!</p>

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<p>I teach high school special ed. There are many good posts here you should consider. I would add that going into teaching because you think it will be easier to get a teaching job than something else may not be the best reason. Lots of good teachers are getting laid off and salaries and benefits are under great pressure in many places. I also believe we’ll see great technology changes in delivering education in the next decade, which may lead to fewer teachers in the traditional sense.</p>

<p>If you were an education major you would have already spent some time in the classroom, which would make for a more informed decision. Experience is still the best teacher…</p>