A Rewarding Journey

It’s no secret that teachers don’t enter the teaching profession for the money. Yet, according to a recent worldwide survey, 90 percent of U.S. teachers said they are satisfied with their jobs, even while their top budget spending concern is the improvement of teacher salaries.

The Teaching and Learning International Survey was coordinated by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. More than 9,000 principals and 152,500+ teachers participated in the survey, including over 150,000 in lower secondary grades and another 2,500 from grades 7-9. The questionnaire asked teachers about their working conditions, professional practices, society’s value of the profession, the importance of professional development, and much more.

“The most rewarding part of the job as a teacher is watching the lightbulb moments,” said Erica Strauss, a fifth-grade teacher at Uplift Peak Primary School in Dallas. “As a teacher, we are able to watch the scholar’s realization of their understanding and then support other scholars finding the same understanding.”

Pablo Gonzales, a Kindergarten and Bilingual Pre-K teacher at the Eladio R. Martinez Learning Center in Dallas, said he loves watching students learn to master skills.

“I will never forget when I witnessed my students reading independently for the first time,” Gonzales said. “It is incredibly rewarding to see your students be successful in the classroom. I have the privilege to be part of the process of a child beginning to master a skill that they will take with them for the rest of their life.”

Valuing the Teaching Profession

One interesting takeaway showed that just 36 percent of U.S. teachers think society values the teaching profession.

“Teachers love their jobs all across the globe, but our teachers, not unlike many teachers elsewhere, feel as though we don’t value the profession,” said Peggy Carr, the associate commissioner for assessment at the National Center for Education Statistics, which conducted the U.S. portion of the survey. “There’s a message there, I think, that we need to think about.”

LIGHTBULB MOMENTS: Teachers fully appreciate the times in which their students clearly learn, grow and thrive. The rewards of the profession are truly found in making a difference.

When asked to elaborate on this response, most teachers said they feel that society values the profession from a macro level, but doesn’t necessarily appreciate, or even know about, many of the details or complicated aspects of the job.

“Society certainly values the teaching profession in the sense that educators have a great responsibility to mold the next generation,” said Courtney King, an eighth-grade English teacher at Thomas C. Marsh Preparatory Academy in Dallas. “As a result, I feel deeply appreciated by my students’ parents and my school community. However, society as a whole often fails to recognize the complexity of the teaching profession and esteem it in the high regard it deserves.”

“Families recognize the importance of education and that teachers are the gateway to their children’s success,” Strauss said. “They notice that teachers share the responsibility to keep their children safe, as well as instill that belief in the children who echo this respect.”

Salaries vs. Satisfaction

Nearly 70 percent of U.S. teachers surveyed said improving teacher salaries was of high importance. Reducing class sizes was the secondhighest budget priority, with more than 57 percent of teachers in agreement.

“People do not become teachers for the salary, but I believe that when a teacher has a means to support themselves and their work in the classroom, there is an increased chance that the teacher could be more satisfied with their work,” Gonzalez said.

Strauss said that teachers are not appreciated monetarily, which can lead to teachers leaving the profession.

“Because of this, our students are not receiving the best education by the best people in the education system,” she said.

The Need for Professional Development

According to the survey results, most U.S. teachers feel well-prepared to teach subject-area content. More than half of the U.S. lower secondary teachers surveyed have a master’s degree, compared to about 41 percent of non-U.S. teachers, suggesting the demand and need for professional development for educators in the United States.

“It may be that American teachers feel they are sufficiently prepared to do their jobs, or it could be that they think the professional development opportunities they are offered are not particularly useful,” said James Lynn Woodworth, the commissioner of National Center for Education Statistics.

Nearly half of the U.S. teachers who participated in the survey noted work schedule conflicts as a major barrier keeping them from participating in professional development programs. Another reason was a lack of incentives for participation. According to the survey, the top three areas of need for professional development are information and communication technology skills for teaching, teaching students with special needs, and approaches to individualized learning.

“Access to high-quality professional development has been paramount to my development as a teacher,” said Gonzalez.

“I have experienced professional development enhance my impact as a teacher by exposing me to new strategies and tools that I can use to better engage and teach my students, making an enormous impact in the experience that students have in my classroom,” said King.