To compare our working conditions here with those back home, I offer this news article regarding teaching in the states:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060509/us_nm/life_teachers_dc_2

According to this article, over 50% of new teachers drop out in the first two years- primarily due to low pay and poor working conditions- and demand should be high for the next 10 years. *ESPECIALLY* the most qualified people tend to drop out, because they can get other jobs and also have the highest student loans to repay.

This would tend to indicate that even American schools are likely to get less, um, picky about education-specific credentials. Or will those who "only" have Ed.s take this opportunity to entrench their position vis a vis those with more challenging subject-specific degrees who want to teach (assuming they can put up with the low income)?

Fire away!

"Steven"

The description of the "average American teacher" was only three years off to describe my daughter: White, 43 years old, married with kids, and religious. That might have described the teachers in my home town in the 1950's, as well. The survey did show that many things have stayed relatively the same, except teachers are more likely to have advanced degrees. Still a 50% dropout within the first five years, but no vocation is without its quitters, even law and medicine.

Steven, you ask if schools will get less picky about applicants in the near future. The article didn't hazard a guess, but the NEA is a teacher's union, committed to upholding the old standards, I suppose. It's the school administrators who have to fill classrooms with warm-blooded teachers.

The teaching fields with the highest demand (or the worst shortage of teachers) are math, science, special ed, and ESL. I'm still hunting around for the daily rate to teach ESL as a substitute.