I haven't posted in a while but I am starting to wind down my military career (26 years so far). I am probably going to stay on another 2-3-4 maybe 5 years but I am starting to do some mid range planning. Apparently it is time for me to grow up and get a "real" job.
While I have all sorts of clearances, skills, and qualifications I am considering a radical change of direction with my life and thinking about teaching in high school or maybe lower level college classes.
I am NOT getting into this for the money--I know and understand my salary will be anemic and I know I won't stay long enough to be "vested" in any additional retirement plan.
The military has a program called Troops To Teachers. It is funded to help Veterans make the transition providing low or no cost training.
I have a BS and MS and know I will have to attend some more training to receive a teaching certificate in NC but I wanted to ask some of my "network" of friends what their experiences were.
To all you teachers out there (especially high school or college types) did you find that job really rewarding? What were some of the best parts? Worse parts?
Would I be coming into the "system" too late? ie have you noticed that people who start teaching later in life have more difficulties? What were they? Were there any advantages?
Is there anything I should really think and consider?
Has anyone used the Troops To Teachers program?
Thanks again for your feedback
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GreenSalsa is a married Army Special Forces family stationed at Fort Bragg, NC
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I'll only address one part of this - your statement about not having enough time to be vested. I retired after 27 years, then spent 16 years under the Oklahoma Teacher's Retirement system. State requirements of course vary, but in Oklahoma, there was the "Rule of 80." (Now the rule of 90). That means that when your age and your years in the system reach 80, you are eligible to retire. For me, that magic number hit at age 62. You may also be able to "buy in" to the system based on your military time.
Teaching can be very frustrating, but also very rewarding. Good luck and thanks for your service.
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Spent a few years substitute teaching and have several friends who teach full time. When deciding if teaching is for you pay particular attention to all the things you will need to do that isn't teaching! Disciplining,counseling,consoling,mediating.....and that's just in the classroom. Then there's the after school and behind the scenes stuff, dealing with parents and other staff,rules and regs and shortages. Let's don't even go to the salary/benefits/retirement place! General consensus among the teachers I know is that you have to have a real passion or calling to teach in order to continue in the face of all this other stuff. If you feel it then go for it. We sure do need good teachers and your age and experience is a plus not a minus.
I teach high school and love it. Rewarding is an understatement. Just touching one person's life makes it worth it and it goes beyond just in the classroom. I still get emails, calls, texts, facebook stuff from students that have gone off, got married, went to college, went in the military had kids....whatever.
Having summers off is fantastic. It gives me time to spend with my family so we can travel. We will be heading out from Michigan to go to San Diego via Denver, Moab and the Grand Canyon. We leave in 2 weeks. School is out next week.
There are several teachers here that got into it later and had no issues. Of course it will matter where you teach. I imagine it would be harder in the inner city.
Green,
I met you and your beautiful family a few years ago in West Yellowstone.
I can't speak as a teacher, but I can speak as a student that remembers two high school teachers and a college professor that had profound positive influences on my life. Most of us never have a chance to do that.
I also know a retired couple that both spent their careers in teaching and speak glowingly of the experience. I can't imagine a more personally rewarding second career.
Retired and visiting as much of this beautiful country as I can.
I know the laws vary from state to state, but in California it is far easier to teach at the college level than the High School level. I teach for several different colleges, two private ones and one public Jr. College. Both private schools required the masters degree but the Jr. College only requires a two-year degree and six years experience in the field. That is unless you're teaching the basic ed courses like English, math, history, or science then you need the graduate degree. But sounds like you have that anyway. I just teach part time a few classes at a time so it is different than being a full time instructor and I only teach in Criminal Justice because that's where my experience is.
Here's the difference here between a full time high school teacher and a full time Jr. College teacher. High school requires all the credentials and student teaching (volunteer for a year) and all the hoops to jump through. Once you're hired you work five days a week teaching five class sessions per day.
Jr. College requires experience in the field you are teaching in, other than the basic ed classes I talked about above. A full time class load is five classes. One JC College class meets for 3 hours per week. That means you will spend 15 hours a week in the classroom. Most instructors arrange that so they only have classes either two or three days a week. Where I teach the classes run from Monday through Thursday so you either work Mon and Wed or you work Tue and Thur. You can even replace some of those classes with online classes and you can teach those from home. I know of full time instructors who only have one classroom class at a time and the rest are online. I actually think it's a racket. Then this college is also on 16 week terms. So your full time load is 5 classes per term. So 15 hours a week for 32 weeks out of the year you are in the classroom. 20 weeks a year you are off. Of course there is all the out of class prep time and you have to maintain 3 hours office time per week where the students can come meet with you. Otherwise it's a racket.
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Go for it --- where else can you get a job that gives you 2 to 2 1/2 months off in the summer and a week or 2 in December and oh, yeah, spring vacation..........oh and I think you'd be a good teacher with your military background --- maybe you can get some order in the school rooms that many of the current teachers can't get.
robbins1 wrote: Spent a few years substitute teaching and have several friends who teach full time. When deciding if teaching is for you pay particular attention to all the things you will need to do that isn't teaching! Disciplining,counseling,consoling,mediating.....and that's just in the classroom. Then there's the after school and behind the scenes stuff, dealing with parents and other staff,rules and regs and shortages. Let's don't even go to the salary/benefits/retirement place! General consensus among the teachers I know is that you have to have a real passion or calling to teach in order to continue in the face of all this other stuff. If you feel it then go for it. We sure do need good teachers and your age and experience is a plus not a minus.
And to add to my earlier post, a lot of what this person describes you don't have to put up with in College. You actually aren't allowed to discuss your students with their parents because almost all of your students are adults. It's up to them to share with their parents. In 8 years that I've been teaching college classes I have never so much as talked to a parent. With college, if you are a full time instructor, there are some behind the scenes things to do like meetings and trainings, but my understanding is it is no where near as bad as high school.
For me, the worse parts outweighed the best parts so I quit teaching after 3 years. Discipline was the hardest part for me. That's one area where it can be an advantage to be an older adult vs. someone fresh out of college. Keep in mind that what works for military discipline won't fly in a school where most parents think little Johnny or Suzie can do no wrong.
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