The economic aspect of the teaching profession has never been encouraging.
It was least so at the close of the recent great war. In 1918 we were
paying our male teachers the munificent wage of $82.35 per month for the
six to nine months of the year during which they were employed. During the
same period, our female teachers were getting an average of $64.72.
The natural consequence of such a situation was a shortage of teachers.
A report of the Federal Bureau of Education indicated that the shortage
in 1918 was not less than 30,000. About 87,500 new recruits are needed
annually for the rural schools alone. In 1916 we graduated less than
one-third of that number from all our teacher-training
institutions together.
In former days a young man was usually delighted to obtain a position on a
college faculty. Recently a senior in a state university was offered a
position in the Chemistry department and refused it, on the ground that it
might tie him up to the teaching profession and thus commit him to
poverty. This attitude is not one of utter selfishness on the part of
young people. Most of them are willing to serve their day, and allow the
reward to be a secondary consideration. They feel, however, that they have
a right to physical comfort while they do serve. They realize that the
standards of the profession are high in every way, and they feel that
such exacting requirements warrant good pay.
They are right; yet there are certain aspects of the teaching profession
which they should not overlook. It involves less pay than it should, but
it also involves certain compensations, some of which are very valuable
and some of which are priceless. It places in the hands of those who
choose it privileges which many of the rich would gladly give their gold
to obtain. It brings within the scope of their experience things which
many men, otherwise successful, have been disappointed in not possessing.
One of these is the privilege of living in the atmosphere and under the
influence of the best thought of all the ages. It is a great mistake to
suppose that bread and raiment are the only necessities of life. Some of
its intellectual and spiritual necessities are quite as commanding as its
physical ones. Those who fail to obtain them pay the penalty by living
cramped lives and usually dying with their deeper longings unsatisfied.
Good pictures, good music, good books, and good friends are among the
kinds of meat that never perish. The values they bring are everlasting.
A man’s life does not consist in the abundance of the things he possesses.
When one has made a living, he has not necessarily lived. He has made only
it possible to exist while he tries to live. His life is made up of the
thoughts he thinks, the hopes he entertains, the associations he enjoys,
and the tasks he performs. Earth and its physical necessities are only the
stage and the setting for the drama. The play itself lies beyond them and
is separate from them. The teacher is permitted to play always a
leading role.
He also enjoys the privilege of doing a work which carries with it
something of its own reward. Some kinds of work detract from one’s
strength and fitness. The work of the teacher adds to them. Each lesson
he prepares leaves him by so much bigger and stronger. Each problem he
masters adds to his mental sinew. Each instance in which he helps someone
on the way benefits him more than it does the recipient of his attention.
His is a treasure which only increases by being given away. His is the
blessing of daily growth and development.
Another compensation he enjoys is the privilege of living among the best
people of the community. One is largely made by his associations, and his
success in life depends largely on the type of friends he can cultivate.
His admittance into the best society is itself a long step on the road
to the highest success.
The ordinary person must live in a new community for a long while before
the best people make up their minds regarding him. Even after a long
period of decision, they do not always see their way clear to admit him
to their circle. The teacher is excused from much of this severe testing.
His very work serves as his credentials. People assume that if he is a
successful teacher he is eligible for the best society anywhere, and they
are usually right about it.
This means very much indeed. One cannot hope to reach a much higher level
than that of the society in which he moves. A certain law of social
erosion is always operative. By it the minds and personalities of people
so act and react upon one another that they all tend to become alike.
This being true, one cannot afford to move in any but the best society
into which he can find his way. This is a matter in which the teacher
has no difficulty.
The teacher obtains a high value in the simple consciousness of being a
worth-while person. One does not have to proclaim such a fact to the
world. If it is true, the world is quite certain to learn about it. It
brings health to one’s body and soul, however, for one to be able to feel
honestly that his life is not a failure. It is a blessed thought to
entertain that one really stands for something in his generation.
The teacher can congratulate himself that he is a world builder. He has
his hand upon the throttle of human progress. He turns the key that
swings open the gate of the future.
The inner life which he possesses is coveted by thousands who can never
have it. They may try to substitute what money can buy for what only
mind can possess, but the effort always ends in pitiful failure. One
cannot long conceal a lack of mind and soul with clothes and paint. The
result is only a vulgar display. The more flash and parade the ignorant
indulge in, the cheaper they look.
The person who possesses real quality and worth does not have to cover
himself over with artificialities and affectations. He has only to
stand forth as he is. The soul within him will tell its own story. Despite
all the cheap ways in which the world indulges, its real hunger is for
genuine worth, unveneered culture, real character.
Some have missed these things because they made the mistake of setting out
to make money alone. If one can have both these things and wealth, so much
the better. If one must choose between the two, however, there is no
question that money is the second choice. Thousands of people of every age
could testify from their own experience that this is true.
One can do much more working for society than he can if he works only for
himself. Incidentally, he may fare best from a selfish point of view when
all things have been considered.
For many years an old colored woman sold peanuts on the grounds of
Tuskegee Institute. A young negro girl who had just enrolled was one day
admiring the buildings. Coming from a poor home in a backward community,
she was amazed that one man had been able to gather together enough money
to erect them.
“If Dr. Washington had worked for himself instead of running this school,
wouldn’t he have been rich?” she said one day to the old peanut woman.
“Law, child! He wouldn’t a been worth a nickel,” was the reply.
She was probably right. Plenty of people have made their only claim to
riches by serving others. Others, with talents as promising, have spent
their lives on mediocre levels, because it never occurred to them to live
for anything but themselves.