Getting out?

In our district if we make it to the playoffs we receive $150 dollars per week. On longevity pay once you have been on campus for 5 years you get an additional $500 dollars to your stipend. It goes up to $ 1,700.

That sounds like collusion.

Getting back to the original question,

I’m still fresh. Year four. Teaching is not that bad. I like my job. I’ve done a lot of manual labor jobs that I actually HATED. Like I couldn’t stop thinking about how much I hated my job before and after the job. For me, teaching has never felt that way.

Do some of my friends make more money? Yeah. But teaching has other benefits too; and money isn’t everything (most people just spend more when they make more).

For example,

I could maybe retire before 65. That’a a big plus. Most of my family never retired: just kept working.

Insurance is pretty good; what some people pay for insurance is disturbing and you could be one surgery away from crippling debt. My parents spent 30% of their income on insurance.

I do drivers ed in the summer, make some extra money. But I don’t “Have” to. 2 months in the summer, spring break, time around holidays-that all adds up.

Job is relatively stress free. If you establish routines and respect; and plan things out, you’re good.

Enjoy coaching a lot. It’s a passion obviously. Sometimes it can be a grind; but some day if I’m the HC I might change up the work load.

I like the idea I can try to make an impact. That my job might help these kids. It can be tough to leave and not have anything tangible to show for it; but making money for someone else isn’t satisfying to me.

Most teachers cause their own headaches. Be like the Patriots and “do your job” keep your head down and just DO YOUR JOB. Own your classroom.

I’m starting my Admin degree. Sure it’s not something I want to do yet, but I might want to in the future. In a lot of ways Admin is similar to coaching.

Some would say admin or teaching is a game. Sure. What career isn’t?

 Never at any public school I worked at. But yeah at every private school I've been at. Heck, I have gotten raises at private schools ahead of longer tenured colleagues because I did a good job. Of course the problem is I make about 2/3 of what a public school teacher make.....so there is that.

I am sure that I will be more cynical. 

Absolutely correct.  Coaches do this to an extent, too.  They make their lives unnecessarily hard by caring about certain things, then wonder why they are in a pissy mood all the time.

As my man Bunk Moreland told his good pal Jimmy McNulty..."you are giving a f***, when it aint your turn to give a f***!"

"One man's fun is another's hell."

Oh yeah I didn't think of that. I wasn't HC so that was one of those beautiful details that I never had to consider.

To be clear-physical labor doesn’t bother me. It was the two summers in a factory that sucked the soul out of me and convinced me to finish school.

You aren’t kidding. I worked at a place that made glade plug in molds and used to break my machine on purpose to get an extra break. There were old ladies that had worked there for years on that job and I don’t know how they did it. It had to be a deep love for their family because I did it one summer and was miserable.

We got a bonus this year. They didn't call it China virus bonus, nor a Christmas bonus... just called it a 'Thank you' bonus.

"Retired" 3 years ago. Had been in education/coaching for 45 years starting out as a volunteer assistant on a freshman team and JV team. After completing my BA became a college assistant, then a DII coordinator while finishing up my MA. Started a family, found college coaching/recruiting not conducive to being a good family man and a good coach, and eventually became a high school head coach and teacher (which was still a grind in its own way, but provided the time I needed to be with family). In the meantime I went from the classroom to administration. At first I welcomed retirement, golfing, being lazy, not a care in the world, but couldn't get coaching out of my system, so I decided to be an assistant at a private school for the past few years. But, as the line in the Godfather III movie goes, "Once you think you're out they pull you right back in!"

have seen coaches do it either way

usually when getting out--their kid was at a different school, they got out to just be able to go see them play

I have always appreciated the coach/son combo on the teams I have been around.  Those kids were usually our best players (maybe not the best athletes, but the best players).  And I got to know most of them since they were in 5th or sixth grade and worked with their dads. 


If there was any question about the kid being up on varsity or on jv---the HC's I worked for did a great job of not making it about the nepotism thing.   The other members of that side of the ball made the call.  I thought that was important.   I never heard any grumblings from the other kids either.  They knew those kids ate/slept/breathed this stuff and were going to do it right.

So you are getting out when your son graduates OR getting back in?