Learning My Value: The Two-Month Post-Teaching Report

I quit another job.

I know what you’re thinking: Again?? But hear me out.

September was my second full month officially out of education. If the first month post-teaching was defined by grief, my second has been all about learning my value.

It’s a message you hear everywhere, right? (Or at least on a lot of LinkedIn memes.) “Teachers, learn to value your skills!” I do know, on an intellectual level, that what I did in the classroom was highly skilled, that I was managing a hundred different things at once—personalities, lesson pacing, learning targets, group dynamics, the timing of the class period, where the hell I put my projector remote.

But knowing your value is different from feeling it in your bones. As such, my first job post-teaching was what you might call an underearning job—I was making far less than my education and expertise level, and giving way too much of my time for too little money.

Without giving too much identifying detail, I’ll just say that I was editing college admissions essay for a big EdTech company. I figured it would be the perfect combination of my two skill sets: writing and editing, and teaching. I knew the pay was low when I signed on, but I justified it to myself as paid training—I’d get some experience, find out if I liked the work, and if I did, leverage it for better-paying gigs.

In truth, I was also scared to fully leap from teaching. Knowing I had a job, even a part-time contract job, even a poorly paid one, gave me a small sense of comfort: I’d be earning something. I wouldn’t be totally just sitting at home, staring into the void of my feelings of grief and failure and holy-shit-what’s-next. I’d have something to keep me busy.

I’ll start with the good things: the company wasn’t a scam. They paid on time, through a real payroll system. It was also a well-run company; the Slack channel was staffed, and mentors were responsive and helpful. There were lots of resources for writing coaches.

I’ll try not to dwell too much on the negatives. The work was inconsistent—some days I’d get four essays in a row, then none for days. The turnaround was fast, 24-36 hours, so there was pressure to burn through the essays quickly, giving more surface-level feedback than I’d have liked.

But the big thing is that the word was just so. low. paid. I’m embarrassed to share how little I was paid, especially for the level of professionalism and quality expected of me. Let’s just say that I made less than a nanny in Los Angeles.

I was raised with too much Marxism to not see how my labor was being exploited to uphold an entire corporate structure. I was doing the work that enabled the whole company to earn a profit—and only making about 20% of what they charged. Yes, I’d also been exploited as a classroom teacher, but at least that had been in the public sector. There weren’t any tech bros getting rich off my labor.

I stayed at the job as long as I had to, in order to learn what I needed to learn. Which is: I do enjoy editing college admissions essays, and I have no interest in becoming a full educational consultant; I just want to work with student writing. I was reminded that I’m skilled at making feedback palatable and actionable to adolescents—and that I’m a damn good editor.

So the moment I signed a contract for a better-paying freelance editing gig, I resigned.

It sounds cheesy, but I meant what I said in my resignation email: I’m grateful for the opportunity. I got some decent training and experience, honed my skills in this very specific genre, and earned enough to keep from dipping into savings these first few months.

But more than anything, I learned my value. I’m worth more than they paid me.

It took getting back into the non-teaching workforce to remember my non-teaching value. The work I’m doing now is better-paid, and I’m good at it. More importantly, I feel good doing it. It challenges me, I feel successful when I’m done, and the clients are happy.

My personal writing is also going well. After publishing very little this year, I’ve had an op-ed accepted by a major publication. I’ve also landed an exciting literary opportunity. I can’t share it publicly yet, but it’s a big step toward my vision and what I really, truly want to be doing with my life. Which is actually kinda scary. You’ll be hearing more about it soon!

As such, I may have to scale back on posts. I’m loving the conversations I’m having here, all of which are incredibly affirming and healing in different ways, but it’s a total labor of love. A lot of hours go into tracking folks down, meeting over Zoom, and editing the AI transcription into something cohesive. My goal is to grow this newsletter into a supportive community and helpful resource for transitioning teachers, where we freely share resources and cheer each other along—and to make it sustainable for me to continue.

So if you believe in this mission, share the newsletter! Send it to your teacher friends, share it on social media, and consider upgrading. (A monthly subscription is literally less than a latte here in Los Angeles.)

I still aim to publish twice a week, with interviews on Tuesdays and blog posts on Fridays—but if you don’t hear from me for a few days, don’t worry! I’m just out here writing, editing, taking care of my kids, and exploring opportunities that align with my value.

And who knows, maybe I’ll even rest one of these days.