Anyone leave teaching? What do you do now?

[tcherjen]

I have been a teacher for quite some time. I put in my letter of resignation for the end of the school year this year. I am looking to do something else. My youngest is going into middle school, so it will be a good time to transition.

 

[Summer2018]

Good luck.

I have 14 more years until full retirement, but I am not going to make it. The earliest I can retire is in 9 years. Right now that is my goal.

 

[Meriweather]

DD taught for 4 years and decided to do a change.
She is now an office manager at a law firm.....loves it, other than the commute

 

[tcherjen]

I understand. I am ready for a change.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

I'm a middle school teacher in a small private school, and it's been a very rough year for the all our middle school teachers.

 

[Marchand63]

I lasted one year in special needs children. Law enforcement now. I still joke I still work with special needs children

 

[Summer2018]

I lasted one year in special needs children. Law enforcement now. I still joke I still work with special needs children

 

[dSp12]

I’m a teacher...9 years in...so still a long way to go. A friend of mine left teaching a couple of years ago and is now a travel agent. She actually planned our honeymoon to Disney. She LOVES it.

 

[Mrs. W]

I was a special education teacher for 4 years. I enjoyed everything about working with students - good and bad - but the workload was unreal.

I was a substitute teacher for a couple of years after I left teaching, and now I work as a contract speech-language assistant. The flexibility and workload are just what I was looking for.

 

[pittypat]

I'm a retired teacher and now I work as a docent at a museum. I love it! I still get to "teach", but I have none of the headaches.

 

[NHdisneylover]

I was an English teacher who went on to become a librarian

 

[emer95]

I’ve been teaching for 13 years, so I have a long way to go. I love teaching, but I've thought about leaving and doing something different so that I can be with my husband. He travels for work, and our youngest leaves for college this August. I’m going to be pretty lonely at home.
I’ve looked into teaching online, or freelance editing, but I’d be a fool to give up my pension at this point so I might be stuck.

 

[NinaBella]

Between retiring from the military and my current job, I also worked as a Child Protection Investigator for our county Sheriff's office. I loved the mission, but for me there was no work-life balance that I needed after 4.5 years of not living at home with my family due to military assignments. I would suggest looking into it. Some places it's with the Sheriff's office, others with DCF. I had a hard time leaving because of the mission, but I enjoy the work-life balance and flexible schedule my current job provides.

 

[quandrea]

Left full time teaching when I had my first child. I homeschool all three kids now, but tutor part time. I really enjoy the one on one aspect of the job. I also like being my own boss and making my own hours.

 

[Frozen Canuck]

Left full time teaching when I had my first child. I homeschool all three kids now, but tutor part time. I really enjoy the one on one aspect of the job. I also like being my own boss and making my own hours.

I, too, left full-time teaching when I had my first child. I homeschooled my first two kids and they are now off living productive lives as electrical engineers. I am still homeschooling the third.

I miss working with the kids, but I don't miss all of the "other stuff" that is involved in teaching. One of the last classrooms that I taught in, I had a teacher aide who had her teaching degree. I asked her why she would "just" be a teacher aide when she had a degree and could be making more (yeah...I was young and naive). She explained that she had two kids. Being a teacher aide meant that she got to work set hours of 8:30 to 3 every day and then could go home and spend time with her family. She also noted that she got to work with the kids, which she enjoyed, but at the end of the day, she didn't do any planning, prepping, major discipline, dealing with parents, attending meetings, or filling in report cards. At the end of the day, her mind was clear and her evenings and weekends were her own. I had to admit that I couldn't claim the same while I was in the classroom.

I have no idea what my plans will be when I finish educating our last child. I have a school library background and would love to become a school librarian again at some point.

 

[quandrea]

I, too, left full-time teaching when I had my first child. I homeschooled my first two kids and they are now off living productive lives as electrical engineers. I am still homeschooling the third.

I miss working with the kids, but I don't miss all of the "other stuff" that is involved in teaching. One of the last classrooms that I taught in, I had a teacher aide who had her teaching degree. I asked her why she would "just" be a teacher aide when she had a degree and could be making more (yeah...I was young and naive). She explained that she had two kids. Being a teacher aide meant that she got to work set hours of 8:30 to 3 every day and then could go home and spend time with her family. She also noted that she got to work with the kids, which she enjoyed, but at the end of the day, she didn't do any planning, prepping, major discipline, dealing with parents, attending meetings, or filling in report cards. At the end of the day, her mind was clear and her evenings and weekends were her own. I had to admit that I couldn't claim the same while I was in the classroom.

I have no idea what my plans will be when I finish educating our last child. I have a school library background and would love to become a school librarian again at some point.

I understand where your colleague was coming from. I love teaching, but all the other “stuff” that goes along with working in the public school system can be a bit much. Tutoring allows me to teach outside of that system. Love it. And I make more money in a couple of hours than I would in a whole school day.

 

[firecracker725]

I, too, left full-time teaching when I had my first child. I homeschooled my first two kids and they are now off living productive lives as electrical engineers. I am still homeschooling the third.

I miss working with the kids, but I don't miss all of the "other stuff" that is involved in teaching. One of the last classrooms that I taught in, I had a teacher aide who had her teaching degree. I asked her why she would "just" be a teacher aide when she had a degree and could be making more (yeah...I was young and naive). She explained that she had two kids. Being a teacher aide meant that she got to work set hours of 8:30 to 3 every day and then could go home and spend time with her family. She also noted that she got to work with the kids, which she enjoyed, but at the end of the day, she didn't do any planning, prepping, major discipline, dealing with parents, attending meetings, or filling in report cards. At the end of the day, her mind was clear and her evenings and weekends were her own. I had to admit that I couldn't claim the same while I was in the classroom.

I have no idea what my plans will be when I finish educating our last child. I have a school library background and would love to become a school librarian again at some point.

This is me. After five years at home with my girls, I became an assistant. The pay sucks but the schedule and benefits are exactly what my family needs right now. I’m a valuable resource to my school but at the end of the day I go home and leave work behind. I couldn’t do that while teaching.

 

[DisneyOma]

I understand where your colleague was coming from. I love teaching, but all the other “stuff” that goes along with working in the public school system can be a bit much. Tutoring allows me to teach outside of that system. Love it. And I make more money in a couple of hours than I would in a whole school day.

Our state has a conflict of interest law that does not allow us to tutor right after we leave a school job. I think it's a year we have to wait/ or maybe two - I don't know, I kind of flipped through that section before I took the poorly written, biased test we had to pass. I think it's a stupid provision, but it's the law. Does your area have the same provision?

 

[quandrea]

Our state has a conflict of interest law that does not allow us to tutor right after we leave a school job. I think it's a year we have to wait/ or maybe two - I don't know, I kind of flipped through that section before I took the poorly written, biased test we had to pass. I think it's a stupid provision, but it's the law. Does your area have the same provision?

No such provision, but I’m in Canada. When I first started teaching, I actually taught all day and tutored all evening.

 

[disney212]

I was an English teacher who went on to become a librarian

Did that require additional school?