Run a whole school. At least five years of teaching first, then a leadership qualification and a job without a teachers' union behind you.
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The median pay is about $115,000 a year. Across everyone in the job it runs from about $76,000 at the lower end to about $149,000 at the upper end. The source is listed under Sources at the end of this page.
10 to 15 years after high school, on the usual route.
$43,400 to $87,000 all in for tuition, fees, exams and kit. Living costs are not counted.
Yes. It is a regulated job, so you need a licence or registration before you can work.
Moderate demand nationally, from government outlook data. Demand varies by region, so check your area.
Or read the whole thing here
What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Median
$115,000
Lower end
$76,000
Upper end
$149,000
Job Bank's national median works out to $55.29 an hour, about $115,000 a year at 40 hours a week. The lower end ($36.54) and upper end ($71.51) are the bottom and top of the wage range for everyone in the group. Principals are salaried, not hourly, so treat the hourly figures as a conversion. Boards publish their administrator pay grids.
About $25,000 a year
Job Bank's median for principals is $55.29 an hour, against $43.27 for elementary teachers
Almost nobody goes straight to principal. You usually spend 2 to 5 years as a vice-principal first.
$72.95 an hour
Job Bank's median in Nunavut, about $152,000 a year
The Northwest Territories follow at $70.41. Among the provinces, British Columbia ($57.21) and Ontario ($57.14) are highest and Manitoba ($49.44) is lowest.
Roughly, all in
$43,400 to $87,000
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
Every stage after the teaching degree is paid while you are on a full teacher salary, which makes it far easier to carry than the original degrees. The low end is a cheaper bachelor's degree plus a B.Ed (Bachelor of Education), two specialist qualification courses instead of a master's, and the two part Principal's Qualification Program. The high end swaps the specialists for a full M.Ed (Master of Education) at a full price university. Many school boards reimburse part of the leadership courses, and most of the ten to fifteen year timeline is required classroom experience, not study.
About $43,000 to $87,000 in all. Everything after the teaching degree is paid while working as a teacher on full salary, so it is far easier to carry than the original degrees. Many boards reimburse part of the leadership courses.
Defined-benefit pension
You stay in the teachers' pension plan, and your higher salary raises what you eventually collect.
Year-round contract
Principals work through much of the summer, but they are paid for 12 months instead of 10.
Full health and dental
Professional allowance
Boards usually fund leadership training and conferences.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
There is no shortcut. You have to teach first, for years.
Become a certified teacher
5 to 6 years
Bachelor's degree plus a Bachelor of Education (B.Ed), then registration with your provincial regulator.
Teach, and build breadth
5 or more years
Ontario asks for at least five years of successful classroom teaching and qualifications across three divisions, so you need experience with more than one age group.
Build the academic piece
2 to 4 years, part time
Ontario requires either a master's degree, or two specialist qualifications, or one specialist plus graduate credits.
Principal's Qualification Program
1 to 2 years, part time
Two parts plus a leadership practicum, run through the Ontario College of Teachers framework. Other provinces have their own leadership certificate.
Vice-principal, then principal
2 to 5 years as a vice-principal
You apply to a board pool, get interviewed, and get placed where they need you. Expect to move schools.
Anything you would want to teach
Your teaching subject is the foundation and you need it first.
English
The job is writing: letters to families, reports to the board, staff evaluations.
Business or accounting
You will manage a school budget, staffing and facilities.
Student council or team captain
Leading people who did not choose you starts here.
You must hold a valid teaching certificate, and many provinces also require a leadership qualification. In Ontario the prerequisites for the Principal's Qualification Program are set out by the Ontario College of Teachers: an acceptable degree, five years of successful teaching, qualifications spanning three divisions, and a master's degree or the specialist course equivalent. Other provinces run comparable leadership certificates through their ministry or a university. The qualification does not move between provinces as smoothly as a teaching certificate does.
Quebec writes the bar into the rules for school managers: a permanent teaching licence, 8 years of relevant experience and 30 graduate credits in management, partly finished after you are hired.
Secondary V, then CEGEP (public college)
2 years after Secondary V
Finish Secondary V, then a 2 year pre-university DEC (Diploma of College Studies). No tuition for full-time Quebec residents.
Bachelor of Education
4 years
4 years, 120 credits, and the usual route to the permanent teaching licence principals must hold. In English at McGill, Concordia and Bishop's.
Build 8 years of experience
8 years
Principal postings ask for 8 years of relevant experience, usually as a teacher, often with time as a department head.
Start graduate credits in management
Part time, while teaching
At least 6 credits of a 30 credit graduate program in school management before your first posting as a principal.
First posting, then finish the 30 credits
Within 5 years
The rest is due within 5 years of your first appointment. McGill's two 15 credit Graduate Certificates in Educational Leadership cover it in English. Université Laval offers a 30 credit diploma fully online in French.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Department head or curriculum lead
The standard proving ground. Run something before you ask to run everything.
Special education or safe schools experience
Boards want administrators who can handle the hardest files.
French-language qualification
French boards have a thin leadership pipeline and promote faster.
Willingness to move north or rural
Remote boards will hand you a school years earlier than a city board will.
Master of Education (M.Ed)
Satisfies the academic prerequisite in one step and signals you are serious.
Supervisory Officer's Qualification Program
The next credential after principal, needed for superintendent roles.
Budget and human resources training
Most of a principal's headaches are money and staffing, not lessons.
A mentor who is already a principal
Boards promote from pools, and the pool is full of people who were coached into it.
Independent schools and international schools abroad hire heads of school without requiring a provincial leadership qualification, and some include housing. The trade-offs are no public pension, no tenure, and a board of parents who can end your contract. Canadian-curriculum schools overseas actively recruit experienced Canadian principals.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
In before the buses. Cover an absent teacher's class because no supply teacher showed up. Then a parent meeting about a suspension, a staffing call with the board, a walk through three classrooms, a budget approval, a fire drill. Lunch is eaten standing up during supervision. After the bell: staff meetings, evaluations, and the evening event, because the principal goes to the concert, the game and the parent council.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Job Bank counts about 39,500 school principals and administrators in Canada in 2023, and 48% of them are 50 or older. The median retirement age is 61, so leadership jobs keep opening.
Two days after Ontario teachers walked out on October 27, 1997, the government amended Bill 160 to take principals and vice-principals out of teacher bargaining units. They now belong to principals' associations instead.
Ontario's leadership prerequisites ask for qualifications spanning three divisions, so a teacher who only ever taught Grade 3 has to add qualifications before they can even apply.
Every list is built from the same numbers shown above, so you can see where this career sits next to the others.
Teaching first, then the rest of the field. See every career in education.
Last checked October 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in Canadian dollars, based on Government of Canada Job Bank wage data and published salary grids. They vary by province, employer and experience. Tuition is for domestic students. How every figure on this site is sourced and checked.
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