Lisa Hendrickson
JOB TITLE: Fourth-grade teacher
LOCATION: Wishek, North Dakota
EXPERIENCE: 22 years
BASE PAY: $62,000
This year, the teachers in Wishek (population: 839) each got a $700 raise. With that, the town’s new teachers finally will clear $50,000, but the raise isn’t exactly changing lives. “I think about young teachers, maybe with young children in sports, maybe some still in diapers. Those types of expenses, plus child care, really push you to the edge,” says Lisa Hendrickson, president of the Wishek Education Association. “You make just enough to not qualify for assistance, but boy, does that put your family in a financial crunch.”
Life in rural America is not inexpensive. Commutes are long and gas costs the same here as in Minnesota (where Hendrickson’s brother teaches and makes nearly double what she makes). Food at rural grocers is costly. Hendrickson often drives an hour to Bismarck to stock up on bulk items.
Today, Hendrickson’s oldest daughter is a North Dakota State University student, majoring in agricultural education, but Hendrickson has advised her to become an agricultural extension agent, not a teacher. Hendrickson says, “In an extension office, she’ll make more money, have a more flexible work schedule, and probably get better medical leave and a better retirement. And less stress!”
Cindy Porter
JOB TITLE: Paraeducator
LOCATION: Westminster, Maryland
EXPERIENCE: 26 years
BASE PAY: About $38,000
Cindy Porter is 65 years old, in her 27th year in public education, and is paid so little for her work with special education students that the only place she can afford to rent is someone else’s basement. (Her rent: $1,025 a month. Her commute: about 50 minutes. Her comment? “It was by the grace of God that I was able to find this place!”)
Last year, a housing study in Carroll County, where Porter works, found that a person would need to earn at least $63,000 a year to afford a one-bedroom apartment locally. Porter is paid nowhere near that much—and hence, lives far away.
Porter’s work, as a special
education paraeducator in a Title 1 school, is essential (and sometimes dangerous), as students’ academic and emotional needs escalate. Meanwhile, her teacher colleagues often have no idea how little she is paid, she says. “I’ve started sharing, and they’re going, ‘What? Whaaat!’”
Porter frequently campaigns for her state union’s ESP Bill of Rights, which calls for a living wage for school support staff.
Karoline Bethea-Jones
JOB TITLE: School secretary
LOCATION: Bergen County, New Jersey
EXPERIENCE: 11 years in the district
BASE PAY: $65,000
When teachers at Karoline Bethea-Jones’ high school call in sick, she picks up the phone and arranges coverage by other teachers. It’s a constant, stressful duty, and Bethea-Jones does it with grace and consideration.
“I have built such rapport with my teachers that they say yes, and say it happily, because it’s me who asked them,” she says.
Solving this daily puzzle requires personal and organizational skills that would be rewarded in corporate America with a six-figure salary. Bethea-Jones knows this because she previously worked as an executive secretary,? and her 2007 private-industry salary was equal to her 2025 public school salary.
“I could leave and find a job that pays me what I’m worth,” says Bethea-Jones, who has a master’s degree and doctorate in theology. “But I know they don’t want me to leave!”
London Bercey
JOB TITLE: School counselor
LOCATION: Lincoln, Nebraska
EXPERIENCE: Three years
BASE PAY: About $57,000
When London Bercey returned home after earning her master’s degree, she first lived with her parents to save money. Today, she has her own apartment but still lives paycheck to paycheck, working part-time as a photographer. The struggle to get ahead—to save enough for car repairs or an out-of-state vacation—has Bercey rethinking her career choice. “My goal at first was to serve the public. But now, because of the financials, my goal is to get a clinical license and move outside the school system,” she says. Switching to the private sector job would immediately boost her pay by about $20,000. Staying in her current job means waiting more than a decade to make that much. Of course, if all things were equal, she’d “absolutely” stay. Despite the emotional tax of counseling, Bercey loves her work.
Thomas Rubio
JOB TITLE: Middle school teacher
LOCATION: Los Angeles, California
EXPERIENCE: 36 years
BASE PAY: $119,000
The lights of LA County are expensive to turn on. According to Zillow, the average home value is almost $900,000! Even after 36 years as a middle school teacher, Thomas Rubio lives frugally. He has a 35-year-old motorcycle with 200,000 miles on the odometer and drives an 18-year-old Toyota Camry that he inherited. After renting for 20 years, he bought his late mother’s house, buying out his siblings’ shares. “Young teachers don’t own. They can’t,” he says.
Rubio’s union is demanding better. The 140-member bargaining team of the United Teachers Los Angeles is negotiating for starting pay to be raised from $69,000 to $80,000 and for the top of the scale to hit $134,000.
Langston Hamilton
JOB TITLE: Substitute teacher
LOCATION: Portland, Oregon
EXPERIENCE: Three years
BASE PAY: $49,000
When Langston Hamilton broke a tooth, he searched online for a cheap dentist and went with the two-star guy who charged the least. “I was like, ‘yep, that’s the place for me!” Still, it cost him $1,800, almost an entire paycheck.
Hamilton has two master’s degrees, and through his union contract, he has the potential to make as much as $79,000—if he can land a yearlong substitute teaching gig. That hasn’t happened yet.
“Hopefully this is the year!” he says. “But so long as I can feed myself and pay the rent, I can get by on less. … I really enjoy the work I do.”
Christopher Morales
JOB TITLE: High school teacher
LOCATION: Fort Myers, Florida
EXPERIENCE: 12 years
BASE PAY: About $56,000
At 5:30 a.m., Christopher Morales opens his classroom and sits down to plan lessons and grade assignments. At 6:30 a.m., he does his first of many, many side gigs—manning the metal detectors at his school’s entrances. At 7:05 a.m., he starts sweating—seven classes in seven periods. (Forgoing a planning period means an additional $2,000.) After school? Morales sponsors three student clubs, including one paying $880.
When the sun sets, he’s teaching biology at Florida Southwestern College, using his earnings to fund his studies. He’s on the way to earning a doctorate of education. On weekends, he works as a janitor. “I’ve been a janitor since I was 13. It’s how I paid for college,” he says.
Today, Morales is a husband, stepfather, and valued teacher, nominated more than once for district teacher of the year. But his pay may never match his worth. The teacher across the hall—who has 32 years of experience—makes just $2,000 more than him.
“I never realized how much [state] politics plays a role,” in determining what Florida teachers get paid, he says.
Zander Epps
JOB TITLE: Middle school teacher
LOCATION: Thornton, Colorado
EXPERIENCE: Seven years
BASE PAY: $82,000
When Zander Epps started teaching, he had a bachelor’s degree and made about $45,000. Since then, he has earned a master’s degree and compiled an additional 50 credits to boost his pay to its current level. “My wife and I wanted to buy a house and start a family and, really, the only way to make more money was to get more education,” says Epps, who lives in a Denver suburb. “I couldn’t pay those bills on $45K.” Today, their son is almost 2—and his child care costs $1,800 a month.
Amy Drake
JOB TITLE: School librarian
LOCATION: Mitchellville, Iowa
EXPERIENCE: 25 years
BASE PAY: $87,000
Twenty-five years ago, Amy Drake was a first-year teacher at a very tiny, very rural school: 350 K–12 students. Her monthly pay? $1,400. Today, new teachers in her suburban district, outside of Des Moines, start at about $46K. Drake, with her three master’s degrees, sits on the far-right lane of her union’s salary scale. She’s also, finally, in a position where she’s not taking work home and is able to work her contracted hours only. “We have an amazing union and a really nice partnership between the union and school board,” says Drake, about the Southeast Polk Education Association.
North Dakota teacher Lisa Hendrickson has taught for 22 years—and gets paid $3,785 a month. “What has changed in society to lead to this devaluation of education, where we don’t prioritize teachers and appreciate the education of kids?” she asks.
