Overcoming Barriers to a Career in Teaching
Late in high school, I decided that I wanted to be an elementary school teacher because it combined my passions for learning, collaboration, and impacting positive change in my community. At first I was very excited about my career choice, because I loved my pre-professional experiences working with elementary school students, and I was fascinated by the research, practice, and policy of classroom teaching.
However, I was surprised when many of my high school and college mentors told me, “You have too much potential to be a classroom teacher.” This social pressure against becoming a teacher is a barrier for me and many of my peers who are interested in pursuing careers in education. I wanted to understand why some people told me that I was “too smart” to be a teacher while others (including myself) found teaching to be intellectually challenging and fulfilling — it seemed like a paradox!
I began to research the history and current politics of the teaching profession in the United States and learned that teachers play a crucial role in determining the quality of a child’s education. For example, a 2005 report by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development found that “there is now substantial research indicating that the quality of teachers and their teaching are the most important factors in student outcomes that are open to policy influence.” In other words, having a strong professional corps of teachers is a key leverage point in creating an equitable education system.
In the United States, however, there is a persistent PK-12 teacher shortage. We cannot get enough people to become teachers, so our nation’s most vulnerable children (children living in poverty, children of color, children with special needs, and children living in urban and rural environments) are disproportionately served by under-qualified instructors. For example, there is a ratio of 4.05:1 of uncertified teachers working in high-minority schools compared to low-minority schools. Recently, the difficulty of finding qualified teachers has caused some states and districts to lower their hiring standards. (Some stakeholders argue that lowering the standards of the teaching profession has the unintended consequence of making teaching less attractive to the most qualified candidates, and many educators worry that these policies may actually exacerbate the teacher shortage in the long-term.)
Based on this research, I began to see how my experience of being told I was “too smart to teach” is part of the dynamics of the teacher shortage, and how it contributes to education inequity. Because college students like me face social pressure and other barriers to teaching, many of us choose not to become teachers, which in turn exacerbates the teacher shortage and contributes to education inequity. Advancing education equity requires policymakers to address the teacher shortage, which in turn requires that barriers to teaching (like social stigma or financial burdens) be removed or lowered.
Some of the most common barriers to teaching that I have observed among college students include the following. Of course, students rarely face all of these barriers at once. Rather, depending on what community a student is from, they will face some barriers but not others:
- Social stigma against teaching (discouragement from pursuing teaching by mentors, academic advisors, and peers)
- Inability to afford tuition for a degree in teaching
- Pressure to provide the “primary family income” and related uncertainty about the ability to support a family on a teacher’s salary
- Lack of role models (people who have similar identities or life experiences) in teaching
- Engrained perception that teaching is a second-choice profession, or an implicit assumption that “anyone can teach”
Many organizations are working on strategies to help college students overcome these barriers to teaching. For example, in my experience rigorous and professionally competitive pathways into teaching like the Stanford Teacher Education Program help me overcome the barrier of social stigma against teaching. This program, and its high standards for teacher candidates, help my mentors understand and support my interest in becoming a teacher because they are impressed by the quality of the pre-teaching classes and the program’s low acceptance rate. Other initiatives that I have seen help college students overcome barriers to teaching are: teacher internship and cohort programs, tuition scholarships and stipends, and teacher induction and mentorship programs. Together, these policies and programs help build a strong professional network for aspiring educators, which in turn strengthens the teaching profession and expands education equity in the United States. I am excited to see how these pre-teaching resources continue to grow and evolve over the next decade!
Krista Galleberg is a senior studying Political Science at Washington University in St. Louis and plans to pursue a Master’s in Teaching and earn a California teaching credential after graduating. She is part of the EdSurge Independent cohort this semester. She is the co-founder of a nonprofit called AlignEd, which connects college students who face barriers to teaching with policymakers who are working on the teacher shortage. Please feel free to reach out to Krista at krista.galleberg@wustl.edu. She would love to hear from you!
