Run a classroom of your own. A state license, a school calendar, and the most openings of almost any job on this site.
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Pay, the path, pros and cons and the facts on one printable page. Good for a wall or a guidance counsellor.
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What you earn and what it costs to get there.
Typical
$63,970
First year
$47,960
Long service, top tenth
$104,340
The national median is $63,970 a year, and the bottom tenth start near $47,960. These are the published figures for elementary school teachers. The spread is mostly geography and years served: the same job pays very differently in New York or California than in Mississippi or West Virginia.
You can look it up before you apply
Every public district publishes a salary schedule
District salary schedules are public documents. They set your pay by years of service and by how much education you have, so you can see exactly what you will earn in year one and in year ten before you take the job.
A permanent raise, not a bonus
Most districts pay more for extra credits and degrees
Salary schedules have columns for additional coursework and degrees. Moving a column is worth money every year for the rest of your career, which is why so many teachers study part time while working.
Tuition, fees, exams and kit. Not rent, food or travel
The low end is two years at a community college at $4,000 to $6,000 a year, transferring to an in-state public university for the last two at roughly $11,000 a year, plus licensure tests and the paperwork: Praxis Core Combined is $150, Praxis Elementary Education is $180, and fingerprinting, a background check and the licence fee come to $100 to $300. The high end is four straight years of in-state public tuition at up to $16,000 a year. Teacher preparation is built into the degree in some states and is a separate year in others. Federal grants exist for teaching a high need subject at a low income school, but read them carefully: they convert into loans you must repay if you do not finish the service.
Fill in the FAFSA (Free Application for Federal Student Aid) in your senior year of high school. There are also federal grants for people who agree to teach in a high need subject at a low income school, but read them carefully: they turn into loans you must repay if you do not complete the service.
A pension
Almost every state runs a teacher retirement system with a defined benefit pension. It is one of the strongest remaining pensions in the country.
Public Service Loan Forgiveness
Teaching at a public school qualifies. Pay a federal student loan on an income driven plan and the balance can be forgiven after 10 years of qualifying payments.
Health insurance and paid leave
Standard in district contracts, usually better than a small private employer offers.
The calendar
Summers, winter break and spring break are real. So is the unpaid work that fills part of them.
The exact path from high school to qualified.
A bachelor's degree, a preparation program with real classroom time, a test, and then a state license.
High school
Grades 9 to 12
Solid grades across subjects, because elementary teachers teach everything. Tutoring, camp work and coaching all count as experience.
Bachelor's degree
4 years
Education, or a subject plus an education minor. Some states require a major in an academic subject rather than in education itself.
Teacher preparation program
Built in, or 1 extra year
Methods courses plus supervised classroom placements. Some universities fold this into the degree, others run it as a fifth year.
Student teaching
One semester
A full semester running someone else's classroom under supervision. Usually unpaid, and the hardest part of the training.
Tests, background check and license
Weeks to months
Basic skills and subject tests, fingerprinting, then your state issues a preliminary license.
English
Elementary teaching is mostly teaching reading and writing, whatever else is on the timetable.
Math
You need to understand it well enough to explain it five different ways to a confused nine year old.
Psychology or child development
How children actually learn, and why a classroom behaves the way it does.
Public speaking or drama
You will be performing in front of a room for six hours a day.
A second language
Spanish in particular. Many districts pay extra for a bilingual credential.
Every state runs its own teacher licensing agency, and there is no national teaching license. California, for example, issues Multiple Subject and Single Subject credentials through its Commission on Teacher Credentialing, and offers separate routes for people prepared out of state, for district interns and for Peace Corps volunteers. Most states accept a license from another state, but usually with extra tests or coursework attached. A few states, New York among them, require a master's degree within a set number of years to move from a first license to a permanent one. Check your own state's agency before you choose a program.
Alternative certification
Built for people who already have a degree in something else. You teach on a provisional license while completing the training.
District intern programs
The district hires you and trains you. You are paid from day one, and the workload is heavy.
Teaching residencies
A paid year alongside a mentor teacher instead of an unpaid student teaching semester. Growing fast because unpaid placements shut people out.
Out of state transfer
Most states have a route for teachers prepared elsewhere, with tests or coursework to fill any gaps.
Things you don't need, but that help.
Special education
In short supply almost everywhere, and many districts pay a stipend for it.
Bilingual or English learner authorization
Required to teach some classes and paid extra in many districts.
Mathematics and science
The shortage subjects. Some states offer loan help or bonuses to get people into them.
Reading specialist
An extra credential that leads to coaching and intervention roles outside a single classroom.
National Board certification
A voluntary advanced certification. A number of states pay a yearly bonus to teachers who hold it.
Real hours with children first
Camp counselor, tutor, coach, after school program. It tells you early whether you actually like this.
Classroom management training
The single thing new teachers say they were least prepared for.
Coaching a sport or running a club
Usually comes with a stipend and it changes how students see you.
Patience with paperwork
Lesson plans, assessments and documentation take real hours that nobody mentions in the brochure.
Teaching is a career people stay in, but it is not a dead end. Experienced teachers move into instructional coaching, curriculum work, assistant principal and principal roles, or district administration. Others move sideways into educational publishing, training, museum education or software companies that build classroom tools. Most of those routes want you to have taught first, so the classroom years are not a detour.
Day to day, pros and cons, where you'd work.
You are in the building before the students and the room has to be ready. Morning is the heavy teaching block, usually reading and math, broken up by a specials period where another teacher takes your class and you finally get to sit. Lunch is short and you are probably supervising part of it. Afternoons are writing, science or social studies, plus the child who needs help and the child who is having a bad day. After the bell it is marking, planning, emails to families and a meeting. Most teachers take work home.
The good
The hard parts
Things people don't tell you.
Public school districts publish their salary schedules, which set pay by years served and education level. You can look up exactly what a first year teacher earns in a district before you ever apply there. Almost no other career works like this.
Teacher shortages have pushed states into paying for the training itself. California, for instance, runs a Student Teacher Stipend Program worth $10,000 to help people through the unpaid placement semester.
Most states use the Praxis tests from ETS (Educational Testing Service). The Core Combined test costs $150 and the Elementary Education test costs $180, and plenty of candidates sit more than one before they are licensed.
Fifty states, fifty sets of rules. Moving is possible almost everywhere, but it usually means extra tests or coursework, so a teacher who expects to move should check the destination state's agency before choosing a program.
Last checked September 2026. Pay figures are typical full-time annual amounts in United States dollars, based on Bureau of Labor Statistics wage data and published pay scales. They vary by state, employer and experience. Tuition is for in-state students at public schools unless the card says otherwise.