“I was paying to work.”
Have you ever gotten a job where the pay was so bad you had to make up for the difference?
A former teacher sparked yet another conversation about how unfairly teachers are being treated.
In her viral TikTok video, she revealed the heartbreaking reality that molding the next generation of thinkers is still a heavily underappreciated profession.
TikTok user @emmtee23 claimed that she was paying to work.
Her video explained the predicament that elementary school teachers face daily.
She said that she worked as a 5th-grade teacher for 2 months before giving up.
“I was pulling out of my savings in order to live,” said TikTok user @emmtee23 in her video.
“I was getting paid and then still having to pull out of my savings in order to literally make a living. Not even make a living, I was paying to work.”
The 23-year-old revealed that she was only making $12 an hour.
With that low pay, especially for a job that spills out responsibilities even after working hours, anyone can be pushed to quit.
She said that at that point in her life, she realized that she didn’t need a career yet so she applied for a job that was way out of the teaching profession.
She applied for a barista position that surprisingly paid more.
As a barista, she is paid $20-22 an hour. That’s a big $8 dollar difference.
It made her so upset that she ranted about how underappreciated teachers truly are.
“I made $12. I made $12 an hour to literally work on Sundays, work on Saturdays, work after work, manage a whole classroom of literally 30 10-year-olds that were just bazonkos,” she said.
“Teachers don’t get credit.”
She claims that her stint as a teacher cost her two months of her life.
She continued saying that she could’ve just been a barista all along and that taking that route wouldn’t have caused her to dip her hand into her savings.
The comment section was torn but most were pushing for teachers to have better pay.
Others couldn’t even believe that a teacher can be paid that low, while others said they already knew where she was from the moment they heard how much they were paying her.
The video has #Arizona in the caption.
Teaching is still one of the lowest-paid jobs in the US.
It is a stark contradiction to the job requirements, skills, and responsibilities.
Salaries differ from state to state and some teachers in Arizona can make as low as $38,000.
As a teacher, you’ll need a college degree and oftentimes, you’ll also need a master’s degree.
This is on top of all the teaching, grading, evaluating, coaching, and counseling that teachers do.
Paying teachers this low can also put the future at risk as children will not get the quality of education they need.
The TikTok user believed that she made the right decision.
Eventually, @emmtee23 shared in a follow-up video that she accepted the barista position.
She said that she wanted to open her own coffee shop anyway so it will help that she start learning the needed skills as early as now.
https://www.tiktok.com/@emmtee23/video/7151437694500097326?is_from_webapp=v1&item_id=7151437694500097326
“I also think I’m going to get certified in yoga and become a yoga instructor,” she added.
“So I’m pretty much living my best life.”
Watch how this former teacher shared the harsh reality of teacher wages.
Please SHARE this with your friends and family.
https://www.tiktok.com/@emmtee23/video/7151158988938235178?is_from_webapp=1&sender_device=pc&web_id=6961630376813135361
