Attracting the Best and Brightest to Teaching
by Richard Long
Quick: List the most important jobs in America. Odds are “teacher” made that list.
According to a Harris Interactive Poll, teachers ranked among the five most prestigious jobs in America. That is why Lee Iacocca, former president and CEO of Chrysler said, “In a completely rational society, the best of us would be teachers and the rest of us would have to settle for something less, because passing civilization along from one generation to the next ought to be the highest honor and the highest responsibility anyone could have.”
Yet today we face a struggle in recruiting and keeping our best and brightest into the teaching profession.After I graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2011, I was a City Year Corps Member in Washington, D.C. public schools. I have been on the ground in these schools, I have seen the teachers and befriended them, and I know their struggles. From my experience, the most pertinent issues that might deter college students from being teachers and keeping quality young teachers in that field are the cost of their degrees compared to the financial benefits and the constant barrage of testing that they will face and be judged upon.
With the rising costs of college and the current state of the jobs market, potential pay
