How do you handle being under pay st work. ,,,you love your profession but its night getting allow the bills pay how so you move to from something you enjoy doing

both meaning side job to pay the bills

unless you can find the first one a way to pay the bills

Second job?

If it's your first job don't expect a great salary...it will grow with time & experience & you will move on to what you enjoy doing....

Loving your profession means a lot. I know people making a mint who are misrible.

My advise to you is the get a little part time job to supplement your income a bit. I am sure you are good at what you do, or you would not love it.

With time and more experience you will find yourself making more money

Good luck

my first thought was...teacher...so i checked..bingo...

don't give up what you love....dedicated teachers are what the world needs more of..
your worth isn't measured in dollars and cents, but by the success of your students...

good luck, Alicia...

Continue to learn..learn while working. Learn what u want to do.. It all in net.
Learn how the millionaires become one.... They work hard...a lot.
Then..pray.. Each day is a blessed day.

First put a budget together so you can live within your means. Second, teachers can make good money and can get side jobs during the summer months. Many of my family members were teachers and all of them ended up with a great pension and other benefits.

I always say that you should only be in the line that you love. Coz passion means a lot to me. Pay is secondary to me coz the enjoyment of the environment is my satisfaction. But you can't follow me coz I'm a very simple gal with less material needs. Other people, i know need the money. But my dad on the other hand says, "who says u gotta love ur job? It wouldn't be called work if it was fun. It'd be called fun"

Teachers in the U.S., generally work in the teaching field, for only nine months per year.

Sorry that you feel underpaid for that.

Just talked to a Teacher here where I live the other day and found out she is making over $60,000 a year shshsh A hell of a lot more then I make...

If you are not getting the pay it could be the school district you teach in.. Time to look to see what others are paying in other Districts..

Perhaps during the months that you do not work or night classes.. (you're a school teacher, right?), you could take some courses that will help you in your field, as the more skills sets you can teach, the more you can make??? At least that is the information I've been given by other teachers who have done that.
It is always best to have a 'job' that you like..
I don't have a 'job'... I have a 'lifestyle'

I guess it is where you live Alice, where I live New Jersey, teachers by their 5th year average $70K a year.. They work 9 months and have the summer off. Pay next to nothing for their healthcare And after a certain point they get tenure ( I think 3-5 years on the job) Holidays, school days off, snow days, sick and personal days too

Then... well.. its the gravey train.. no chance of losing your job.. ( tenure) no reason to really excel.. just show up.. do you time.. get the pay raises every year (out of my taxes).. and retire with a nice pension


New Jersey, Alice.. come on over and join the union.

I think I am going to go with the others on this thread and say second job. I have a second job and it really helps.

How the heck can you work a second job when you have planning and all the paperwork you have to do to show what, why and how you are teaching.
My teaching friends are up till midnight working getting ready for the next day.
Some are not leaving school until 7 or 8 at night.
Where the heck do you fit in a 2nd job?
I say go to a country that pays more.

It might not be a second job, but what about tutoring? Or what about looking at teaching online courses?

Otherwise, it is budget and cuts to live within your pay. I understand the low pay, and our 12 hour work does not allow for a second job, as no second company wants to hire a person that is restricted to only one available day two out of four weeks. I have cut and scrimped for several years, and now I am just starting to get a little reserve. Best if luck, but it can be done even though it is not fun.

Hi Alicia,
i'm close to retirement years and taken some time out reflecting on life, etc., etc. & thanks to Mingle, re-adjusting my thoughts. So here's my take.

Lets say you are a farmer with a 2 acre patch. You grow tomatoes, you love tomatoes & the local ketchup factory also loves you; but they barely cover your costs.

Now you can grow potatoes & there's a chip factory willing to take in your potatoes at a higher price. The problem is potatoes suck out more from the land; so there's larger re-investments.

So as a small farmer you explore and find that green peas tendril can grow comfortably next to tomatoes plant. The tendril leaves don't compete for sunlight & so on.

What i mean is the grass may look greener on the other side; those high paying teaching jobs in cities carry lot more stress (i think).

So now the question is what sort of green peas. Tutorials, oh, no. The peas could be some of the best work submitted by your own students in the past.

Have you documented a drawing(?) taken a video of a recital(?) and so on; recycled it for next batch to come up with their own judgement? Asking a student for his opinion, thoughts as compared to demanding he get those exam Q's right? Taken pictures with a small group; (not those class photos where every kid looks like a big dot on a dash). At some point of time these things start coming together; maybe as a handbook; or something larger.

Just read about a Vietnamese teacher working in an Indian school here. She says she searches for jokes to share with the children at the end of a class; cause she believes laughter should be part of the journey of learning.

Oh yeah, you could always invite a person like me to hold a class. My method would be to ask your kids to help me out with a math problem; cause I'm dumber!! Bet you, they will.

Conclusion: May not be the solution you are looking for. If you are looking for a larger income; think about publishing some of the results from such experiments or working on this with your peers and being part of a larger school program.

We normally focus on why kids are doing badly in math or spelling. We don't explore why some of them are doing well. just thinking aloud.

i'm assuming that American school systems are similar to what we have in some of the elite schools here.

Let me know how right or wrong I am.
I like to learn things the hard way.

Or show them Crystals Unicorn Horse and ask them what they think of the person who painted it.


Pegasus is quite dear.

we were having a family discussion on various religions one evening and my daughter, 6 or 7 then, asked: ok, so what is the religion of this cat?

ok, i think i over did this a wee bit but could be this what's happening here: In a bus one has a view of the countryside but when you are in the driver's seat all one sees is the road & traffic.

if you tell us what specifically draws you to your present job maybe other teachers here could 'add value'? Specifics could begin with subjects, class; a bit about the community the kids come from and so on?