You’ll know that being a teacher is an important job. In fact, for many, it’s more than a job; it’s a vocation and even a calling—they want to make the world better for the next generation, and they want to be able to help that generation be all it can be.
Yet, although most of the time you’ll consider teaching to be a selfless kind of profession because of all the hard work it takes and all the positive outcomes teachers can give back to their students and the community (and the world in general), it shouldn’t all be about other people—it should also be about you and what you want out of life.
Being a teacher is wonderful, but you must also ensure that you are taking the right steps for you and your career. It can be hard to separate what you do for others from what you do for yourself, but it’s important to try, and career progression is a great way to do it.
Read on to find out why career progression is so important for teachers.
Professional Development
Career progression will give teachers plenty of scope for professional development, and it might be that they decide they don’t want to be in the classroom anymore, but instead want a role that has a different kind of impact on the world.
A teacher can move on to do all kinds of different jobs, using their knowledge of teaching to their advantage. They might stay in the education sector and work towards their school district leadership certification so they can move into an administrative role, for example; or they might decide to move in a different direction altogether, but still use their skills to enhance their future work.
When you look at your own career progression, you can make that choice for yourself.
Personal Growth
Career progression for a teacher will allow them to develop many new skills and gain a lot more knowledge—ensuring that they are also able to grow personally at the same time. They’ll be able to challenge themselves and, once they have the knowledge and perhaps qualifications they need to move forward in their careers, they’ll start taking on more and more responsibility.
This will all add up to increased confidence, which is good for an individual, and it will also help the children in the classroom. With more confidence in their abilities, teachers can start using new teaching methods and explore more ideas, helping their students gain more of an education.
Positive Impact on Students
As a teacher, everything you do will have an impact on your students, and you’ll want that impact to be as positive as possible. Even though it might seem counterintuitive to help yourself rather than your students, even this can have a positive impact on them.
If they see you striving for more and looking for options when it comes to your own career progression, they will learn from this and see that it’s good to have ambitions and make plans. So by helping yourself get to where you want to in life, you can help your students learn how to do the same and be what they always wanted to be.
