Some readers may envision teachers sitting on the beach, fat and juicy trashy novel in hand, but I am certain that very few of our nation’s 3.3 million teachers are living that life. Some teachers do take the summer off, and some study or travel to enhance their understanding of the world they teach about, but a heck of a lot of our teachers are working at summer jobs.
What sort of jobs? It’s a short list: tutoring is a good gig but hard to find. Working a summer camp seems like a natural fit, but there aren’t enough counselor jobs available, and lots of them go to older teenagers. Some teachers work in child care, and others find jobs in retail stores or in restaurants.
A few websites help teachers (and others) find work, like this one, this one, this one, and this one , but I suspect that most teachers find jobs through local contacts.
That’s what Harry Chandler did, in Oregon in the mid-1980s. I met him there while doing my first piece for the PBS NewsHour, then called The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour. Harry taught high school but spent his summers working in something like a 7/11. He spoke persuasively about the embarrassment he felt when waiting on his high school students, his sense that society didn’t value teachers. He felt then–and I agree–that our society in general, and not teachers, should be embarrassed that its teachers were earning so little that they had to scrounge for summer jobs–competing with their students for the jobs in many cases. Harry and I stayed in touch for the next 10 or 15 years, and as I recall he was working summer jobs right up to retirement.
We simply don’t pay teachers well. Although the national average teacher salary increased from $59,534 in 2016-17 to $60,462 in 2017-18, after adjusting for inflation the harsh truth is that the average teacher salary has actually decreased by 4.5% over the past decade. And this is taking place during an unprecedented economic boom!
In addition to this blog, I write regularly at Themerrowreport.com. About four years ago I raised the question about teaching: A profession, a calling, or just a job? I invite you to take a look. In that piece, I suggested that teaching wouldn’t be a real profession until teachers can answer the call of nature as needed. Amend that to add that teaching won’t be a true profession as long as many of its practitioners are forced to work at 7/11, MacDonalds, Kohl’s, Home Depot et alia during the summers.
It’s long past time for us to treat teachers with respect. We can show our respect in three ways: raise the entry bar to the profession, make it easier for teachers to do their jobs, and pay them properly.
Meanwhile, should you happen to encounter one of your children’s teachers working in retail or at a restaurant, be nice–but also be embarrassed.
I will write more about how we can make it harder to become a teacher but easier to be one in the coming weeks
