How would you know that when I’m telling you they do not?
You have described two teachers: one who you say you suspect is doing exactly what he wants and another who apparently isn’t.
So how do you know, exactly, that “they” - all the teachers on earth who have Ph.Ds - are not doing what they want? From your grand sample of one you have deduced this?
How do you know they do not, Lakai? You seem to have an enormous chip on your shoulder in regards to a career in education. Some people, despite, and perhaps because of their extensive educations want to go into the field. Others end up teaching high school because they need the money – doctorates are not cheap.
Education at all levels is worthwhile, if only because it will lead to further learning. Sure, the farther you go, the more advanced the knowledge is, but would you have gotten there without learning how to read and write?
High School Biology teacher with a Ph.D. in Biochemistry here.
Most of the general reasons for why a Ph.D. would go into teaching high school have already been stated. The reasons that pertain to me personally:
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My primary reason for getting a doctorate was not to become a “professional” scientist, it was for love of the subject and a desire to learn more. I have an almost compulsive desire to learn and I enjoyed school so much that I just kept going.
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I had many opportunities to mentor and teach as a grad student and post-doc, and found I immensely enjoyed interacting with students. Why not do what you enjoy?
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It was clear that the universities and colleges were swamped with Bio Ph.D.'s vying for positions. Facing several more years of dragging my family around the country chasing down a tenure-track position wasn’t appealing. My wife had a career of her own, and we needed to settle down somewhere so she could advance in it.
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We wanted to move closer to family. Teaching high school provided the flexibility to allow this to happen. Plus, most of my wife’s family are teachers at the elementary and high school level in the area and have been a major source of moral support.
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As a researcher I was spending far too much time in the lab, and not enough time with my family; my first daughter was very young at the time and had become my whole world. I now have the time to spend with my family and don’t feel compelled to go into work at night or weekends: that stack of papers on my desk can wait another day to be graded, whereas before, I just HAD to drive into the lab and process that 10 hour-time point sample, or else the entire experiment that I’d been working on for a month would be a bust.
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I’m a fairly gregarious person. Bottom-line, lab bench work is often lonely and tedious work and I was beginning to bore of it after 12 years of working in a lab in some capacity. Taming a classroom full of 36 hormone-charged teenagers is never boring!
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And yes, money was a concern. I went from being paid $25K with no retirement benefits (not even Social Security contributions) and sucky medical benes as a post-doc, to earning $42K with decent retirement and medical benes as a first-year teacher. Five years later, I’m definitely still earning more as a teacher than I would’ve had I stuck with research. Plus, the Ph.D. does put me at the top of the pay scale, with an additional 5% above that.
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Many of my students say I’m the best teacher they have because I clearly know the material I’m teaching them and they learn alot (I don’t know if I should feel flattered or sad that they have such a lack of confidence in the abilities of their other teachers). I use my unique experience to help counsel students that are interested in a career in science. Other teachers frequently ask me to help explain a scientific topic and I’ve taught classes for student teachers. I help select textbooks and develop and evaluate curriculum. I run science fairs and science clubs. I’ve never felt my decision to become a teacher was a waste of my education, as it’s clear that my skills are needed and appreciated. What more could one ask for in life?
A great post. I’ve posted elsewhere on these boards my feelings that teaching is the noblest of professions, and your message adds credence to my opinion. We need more teachers like you.
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- This isn’t quite what the OP was asking about, but it is something along those lines: a friend of mine went through a stint in the US Marines to pay for college. In the Marines he was specifically a sniper, and also did some military police duty. When he got out, he went to college and got a master’s degree in chemistry.
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- After he had his degree he went out and got a job at a local company, doing lab work. After only a couple months of it, he said that it was about the most boring thing that he could have imagined. Additionally he felt silly doing it because in his words “it doesn’t really require anything close to a master’s to do”. The test procedures were written in binders, and the binders had to always be open to the pages pertaining to the part of the test he was doing (that is, you weren’t ever supposed to just “do it from memory”). All it really required was the ability to read and some familiarity with the ternimology and equipment involved. There was no decision making at all, and nothing out of the ordinary ever occurred. It even paid better than he expected starting out, but any promotions to doing anything different were a long ways off and he said “I just go into work every day and doze, it’s so boring”. He asked around over the next few months about possible other employment in the same company and elsewhere, but all of it seemed just as dreary.
- After eight months he quit and went through a local police academy and eventually became a police officer. Last time I heard he was employed by the US Marshals service.
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Female PhD here, Math Education. This forum is very helpful. Glad I found it since I’m finding I’m not alone wondering what to do. Got the PhD last year at age 50, held tenure track Asst. Prof. of Math at a small rural college in Nebraska last year and had the worst time ever adjusting to being 1200 miles from everything and everyone I knew. Came back to the South, and now in transition. Took all the courses for secondary teacher licensure, as a back up plan because tenure-track positions are extinct, and seems only math instructor positions are out there. Out of those, most now are adjuncts! I’m considering high school teaching as a last resort because it is hard to keep a job in public schools given No Child Left Behind and the accountability placed on teachers to get the students to pass end of course tests. Classroom management also an issue–some situations are unavoidable. Kids act up, show out and even concoct preposterous stories to get teachers in trouble. There is a lot of stress placed on teachers, from accountability to managing behaviors, and it’s a long work day full of team meetings, tutoring, dealing with parents, and other administrative junk that can put one’s job at risk. So job security in a high school is a concern. Even though I like teaching the kids and all, it’s hard thinking about going into a high school with a PhD and turning out to be a failure & losing the job because of all these requirements and demands. College teaching is less stressful—but less available as well. Any thoughts? Anyone else going through this?
I’ve never understood this. A college professor is hired on to a job where teaching is looked upon as a secondary function.
Some people seem to think that the only suitable places for a Ph.D is a college lecture hall or a laboratory. And that if a Ph.D winds up in neither of these places, they must have screwed up somehow. Some Ph.D’s even believe in shit like this. It makes them feel better about their career choices, I guess.
I know that for myself, I went to grad school so that I could wear whatever hat I want to. Now I wear the hat of a scientist bureaucrat. Maybe a few years from now I’ll decide to re-try teaching or something else. The days of doing the same job for 30 years are coming to an end. So are the days of getting a job just because you have fancy alphabets behind your name.
This is true at major research universities, but there are colleges where teaching is high priority.
Oh, this is a zombie thread.
I’d still like to announce that I have a Ph.D., and I’m currently staying at home raising my daughter and writing smutty novels that I self-publish for Amazon Kindle. It’s a hoot, and exactly what I always wanted to do. Is it “better” or “worse” than teaching high school, Lakai? I really want to know what you think.
The world of academia suits some people, but not all. Plenty of people accidentally end up with a Ph.D. before they figure that out.
Without going back and reading all the posts from 9 years ago, –
Maybe Dr. So and so married a women from that town, maybe with a PhD or a MD herself, and they like living there, so he teaches high school and they have a dog and he likes to fish.
Just because a guy has a PhD doesn’t mean he can’t spend his life doing that he wants to or likes to do.
I have a friend with a PhD in Meteorology, and he just used his credentials to go and hang out in exotic places, and now he’s retired and rents a shabby little house and drives a Honda Fit and complains about how fast his lawn grows. We go bird-watching and to ball games together.
Such innocent days 9 years ago, not one person suggested that they cook meth
My high school chemistry teacher had the first two initials D and R. He always signed everything as Dr lastname, even though he barely had a batchelors degree never mind a doctorate.
My HS AP Stat teacher and his wife the AP Bio teacher both held doctorates and were bumming around teaching K12 before a position opened up at a college for the husband. I think the wife uprooted too and either taught at a JuCo or HS or both. Great guy, but you could tell he was bored and disappointed teaching HS because of his devil-may-care attitude towards teaching. We were all pretty smart kids and he basically taught for a day and goofed for a day and the majority of us all got A’s and 5’s on the AP exam.
Ya know…you just expressed one of the major problems we have in our education system these days. People don’t think that teaching is a real job. Teaching is probably one of the most important professions that exists, and yet we treat teachers like shit and pay them worse.
True.
All my high school teachers had PhDs, and not in education. My high school was part of the university, so most of them followed the same pathway, they just asked to teach there. Some moved when positions opened in the main campus, but others really enjoyed teaching their favorite subject, and they remained. They were truly dedicated to teaching.
Even the teachers with whom I had problems (about half of them), they all enjoyed teaching. They taught us, even when they had PhDs, they preferred to teach teenagers (at a magnet school). In fact, that is one of the “problems” my school has had a few times. Because most of the faculty is made up of PhDs and not people with EdD or education majors, some others have complained the school is not qualified to teach teenagers. :rolleyes:
Keep in mind that he expressed that thought 9 years ago. Perhaps his opinions on the matter have shifted in the past decade.
Now that Lakai has an advanced degree in an area where obtaining any job is difficult (JD) I have to think he has a very different perspective on this question. You can’t automatically assume people still agree with thoughts they had a decade prior.
I can’t believe that in a thread like this, none of our resident pedants jumped all over Lakai for his use of “would of” and “might of.” Or maybe that wasn’t a thing yet back in 2005.