October 08, 2009 
It was so refreshing for me to hear Elisabeth, a navy spouse from Groton CT, share the passion for teaching. “I just knew I wanted to be a teacher ever since I was a little girl.” And she wasn’t about to let the military lifestyle get in the way of this dream. Sure, with each move she faced some initial challenges, but overall she has found her experience to be even more fulfilling than if she had stayed in one spot. I asked what was most difficult about job hopping and her four military moves and she shared, “Re-credentialing wasn’t really that hard, it was just a bit pricey.” However, Military Spouse Career Advancement Accounts (MyCAA), a program that has replaced the former Spouses to Teachers program as of last October, may ease the financial burden Elisabeth faced by providing financial aid to military spouses pursuing portable careers such as teaching.
Sara, another navy spouse said she got a teaching job very easily in San Diego after subbing in a district. They appreciated that she was bilingual and granted her an emergency credential so she could teach special education in an classroom teaching English as a second language. Sara teaches during the day and attends National University in the evenings where she plans to get her special education teacher certification. She said that while her spouse is deployed she takes an extra night class and this helps her progress towards her goal more quickly. “When I faced our first deployment, I wasn’t in school and I would just lock myself in our house, order pizza, and watch movies feeling depressed; this last deployment I took two classes each month. Being busy with lesson plans and school made the time fly by and I am proud of all that I am accomplishing!”
Jill, a Marine spouse living in Connecticut had been pursuing her teaching degree in Vermont and had to drop out of her program prior to completing it. However, with a little creativity, she was able to take a few classes locally and through distance learning and transfer the courses back to her original school all while working part time at a preschool in Connecticut and balancing that with her spouse’s busy recruiting schedule.
“The relationship between children and their teachers tends to be closer in the preschool, and I feel almost like a surrogate parent or a mentor more than just a teacher; I love it!” she shared.
Jill plans to keep this job for a while and just focus on studying and passing her national licensure exam and the Connecticut state teacher’s exam. Then she will decide if she wants a new job. Her tip for spouses that want to become teachers is to get the classroom experience. She thought she wanted to teach older children, but now that she has worked in a preschool setting, she feels that younger children are a better fit. She explained how other students from her college have interned at the school where she works; they have discovered firsthand if they prefer working with young children at the primary level, where the teacher focuses on the whole curriculum, or if they prefer secondary schools where teachers focus on a particular subject of interest.
“The best way to know what you like is to actually try it out,” Jill explains. “I never knew how much I would enjoy the little ones.”
Some teachers get their credentials and find the classroom isn’t for them. Danielle, a certified teacher in New Hampshire, obtained her Master’s Degree in Education and an additional certification in the Wilson Reading System. Danielle found she preferred working with kids one-on-one and appreciated the flexibility of tutoring versus committing to a full-time teaching job. So Danielle started her own reading tutoring business and consults with various schools. While tutoring is portable, Danielle said that if she moved she would feel an ethical obligation to offer her clients adequate referrals and would need to do some initial marketing initiatives at her new location. She said that this isn’t unique to military spouses; everything worthwhile in life has its challenges.
Tips For Teachers…
Learn to play the field:
Teaching includes so much: from working at a preschool or a child-development center to teaching at the college level. Whether it is substituting or becoming a teacher assistant, experience in the classroom is what builds credibility and helps you find the best fit within the teaching profession. Try out working with different age groups and different districts, form lots of relationships, and get noticed.
Beautiful things are seldom easy:
While programs are making the transitions easier, it’s important to remember that most worthwhile projects in life take some effort; becoming a teacher that faces multiple moves is no exception.
We live and learn:
Spouses shared that substitute teaching isn’t as fulfilling as being a teacher. They also shared that the credentialing and re-credentialing seems daunting at the time, but looking back it really wasn’t that bad; their suggestion is to just go for it. They all agree that being able to say you have taught on both coasts, or even overseas, far outweighs the experience of being in the same classroom your whole career. You are able to bring a richness to your classroom as your career progresses that you really begin to appreciate.
Teacher Resources
Military Spouse Career Advancement Accounts (MyCAA): www.militaryonesource.com
ASCD (formerly the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development): www.ascd.org
National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education: www.ncate.org
Substitute teaching: www.Edu411.org
National Education Association: www.nea.org