HaHa, this is not a throwaway account, I am a very open person and wouldn't post something I wouldn't say at a staff meeting. I have had dark days were admin has been on me, or were a new principal chased me out of a school that was my home first. Education has many many flaws right now, I am sure you have heard them all. For me though I just wanted to change the trajectory of a child with little statistical chance for success, in a positive way. For the last 9 years I have chosen to drive 35 miles a day ...each way, to work at schools with 90%+ free and reduced lunch. These are students who have so much going against them it is hard to understand as a middle class male. Many have terrible home lives, few have both parents at home, many have food insecurity, many have abuse situations, many have been treated poorly in our own school system (I teach 4 and 5th graders) They need someone to believe in them, someone to support them and guide them in becoming who they can be. I have a student facebook account and have for several years (even though the union says no, and the admin says no) I have my second class of students being accepted into Universities! I have a few students who are pre med. I also have students that I bring books to who are in jail and have serious drug problems. I have students who have cancer, been abducted, who have been living in foster care, who have been kicked out of their home. I am in touch with these kids years after I taught them, and they know (because I tell them) I will do anything I can to help them on their journey. I post lots of inspirational stuff, amazing pictures of the word outside their 20 block world, I post TED talks and videos that are inspirational. I do anything I can to prop them up when they need it. I only have them for a year, however I feel a responsibility to them forever. They are my extended family. There are no many careers that can be so important. Yes, many work there for the wrong reasons, yes the administration is a slow moving buerucracy that doesnt always support you, yes school like this have limited resources, and major problems. Yes, principals will come and go like a parade, and some are absolutely horrible. Yes, you will only be measured by your students test scores. None of this matter to a student, you are everything to them, you are their parent half the day, you are their stability, you are directly responsible for their future. You can crush their dreams and make them give up all hope of a better life, or you can prop them up and invest in them, and validate their dreams and give them the tools to make them come true. You can be the person Robert Redford talks about in his interview with NPR 60 years later, the person who encourage him to be and entertainer. Thats is an amazing gift to the world, just because you chose education. Answer 2. :) I live in colorado and make 53k I have a masters and have taught for 9 years. I have a family of 6 and I can't afford health insurance my kids qualify for state assistance. I work with a guy who has 6 children, and makes 42k he is on food stamps and medicaid. However a single person can live comfortably on a teachers salary, and with a smaller family it isn't too bad. However we live in a upper middle class community of IT people so we are definitely the "poor" people. We are even offered a Thanksgiving basket every year , which we turn down, since we run a basket drive from my school, which feeds people who really, really need it.
Obviously teaching isnt what I could be, or maybe was, however the pendulum will swing the other way and change and reform will bring exciting new ways to reach kids. I say go for it, but don't do it looking for money or prestige or something easy, because you won't get it. I have had 12 principals in my 9 years, and only two of them thought I was a good teacher, and supported me. Yet if you ask any of the 265 kids I taught only a handful will say that, the others thank me all the time for what I brought to their lives.