Alternative Careers For Teachers To Teach Outside The Classroom

There are over three million public school teachers working across America. With demand for educators at an all-time high, we’re seeing more higher learning institutions push the prospect of teaching which is creating an influx of educators that have an interest in helping further support the development of youth.

For the majority of learners that graduate with a teaching degree, their trajectory will lead them to teach grades K-12 in a classroom.

• But what if you want to take your teaching degree and do something different?
• Are their alternative careers for teachers that can get you out of a conventional classroom setting?

The answer to that question is a resounding, yes! Below, we explore additional options.

1. Teach A Trade

Not all teachers need to be teaching spelling, history, math or other traditional subjects. Many teachers make just as big of an impact by teaching trades.

As far as trades go, we see teachers escape traditional classrooms by teaching cooking, electrical work, and mechanical skills. Those subjects are by no means comprehensive so if you have another skill you’d like to teach, look into local districts to see if they’re offering more trade/elective classes.

2. Become a Private Tutor

If you can drum up a steady stream of affluent clients, private tutors can make a great living year-round. This is especially true if you’re a private tutor that holds a teaching credential.

There are two ways you can go about building a client base to support this alternative career option.

For starters, you could advertise your business on your own to capture clients. If doing that falls outside of your comfort zone, consider partnering with a tutoring agency that can provide you with a stream of work in exchange for a portion of your earnings.

3. Impart Life Skills Via Prison Education Programs

Tens of thousands of people are living in juvenile detention centers across the United States. These kids benefit from having quality educators come in and teach them life skills that help them better assimilate into society.

While there may not be a lot of money in hooking up with local detention centers to educate at-risk youth, doing so is certainly a rewarding job in its own way and is about as far from being in a traditional classroom as you can get.

4. Make Physical Education Your Teaching Specialty

Imagine if you could spend all day being active, helping young people stay healthy and being outside. Now imagine being paid the same amount as your in-class colleagues while enjoying those perks.

All across America, physical education teachers enjoy that “imaginary” life.

Granted, managing 30+ kids in physically active situations is no walk in the park. Still, P.E. teachers get to impart lifelong skills on young people without needing to spend their career standing in front of a whiteboard.

5. Craft Educational Materials And Sell Them

If you’ve ever wondered where all those worksheets come from that teachers use to help subsidize their lesson plans, wonder no more! They come from textbook providers or private online repositories.

In both cases, creative education professionals are the ones that craft those worksheets for distribution.

If you have a knack for creating engaging educational materials, you could sell what you come up with to private websites or big-time educational material distributors and make a career of it. Popular education material publishers/distributors include Cengage Learning, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Pearson Education, and many others.

6. Make A Career As An Online Educator

As the internet becomes increasingly prevalent, we’re seeing an influx of kids opt for online primary school. You may have even noticed commercials for digital schools like ABC Mouse at some point while watching television or browsing the internet.

These schools are powered by educators like you and present unique alternative careers for teachers for those that are tech-savvy and would love the opportunity to work remotely.

7. Try Home-Bound Education

Within a school’s population, there’s usually a small percentage of students that have a special circumstance that keeps them out of the classroom. These circumstances range from being chronically ill to having social anxiety.

To ensure that those students receive an education, some districts will send teachers out to assist kids with work packets that they receive every week. You could be one of those teachers.

In this line of work, you’ll likely be assigned to a variety of students you’ll rotate between throughout the week. That means you’ll be able to have an impact on multiple lives.

8. Help With Home Schooling

Similar to helping home-bound kids, there’s a large population in America that is home-schooled. If parents that are managing home school situations need help, you can provide that assistance.

Assisting with home school could be a temporary, substitute-like job or something more permanent if parents are looking for a full-time teacher to aide their children.

9. Take Your Education To The Next Level

There are a lot of non-teaching education jobs that exist on a typical public school campus. Among those jobs are positions like a school counselor, vice-principal, and principal.

Not only do those jobs play well with a teaching degree but they also tend to pay a lot better than a typical classroom teacher might make.

There Is No Shortage Of Rewarding Alternative Careers for Teachers

If you’ve learned anything from this post, we hope it’s that there is no shortage of alternative careers for teachers that can bring deep levels of meaning to your life.

Hopefully, one of our suggestions above has inspired you to explore an unconventional career path. If not, know that what we’ve listed just scratches the surface of what’s possible.

Keep digging for the perfect position and feel free to browse more of our educational content if you need additional inspiration.

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