Did You Know? Questions and Answers About Education,
Schools and Our Professions
PUBLIC SCHOOLS RULE. More than 50.7 million students attend a traditional public school, based on federal projections for the fall of 2022, which makes up 85 percent of all K-12 students.
PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS RULE. According to the Census Bureau, Pre-K-12 teachers form the largest occupational group in the United States.
FULL TIME AND OVERTIME. On average, teachers work an average of 10 hours per day and 52 hours per week. –Factretriever.com
OUT OF POCKET. Approximately 92.4% of teachers spend their own money on their students or classrooms. –Factretriever.com
MENTAL HEALTH. Children and adolescents are more likely to receive needed mental health care in their school than in any other setting. –National Center for School Mental Health
CLEAN AIR. Indoor air can be up to five times more polluted than outdoor air. –Environmental Protection Agency
BROADBAND. Only 59 percent of school districts in the U.S. have hit the Federal Communications Commission goal of providing broadband services of at least 1 MBPS (megabytes per second) per student. –Connected Nation
LITERACY FOR OLDER KIDS. Lack of sufficient literacy skills is a big part of why roughly 500,000 students drop out of U.S. schools annually. Literacy instruction is just as important for middle and high school students as it is for early elementary students because the transition from “learning to read” to “reading to learn” is often a difficult one. NEA has helped launch www.adlit.org, a multimedia library of free, research-based resources designed to help struggling readers in grades 6-12. It may be just what your students need.
DOLLARS AND SENSE. The most common reason a person leaves teaching is the low salary. –Factretriever.com.
A SIMPLE THANK YOU. A survey of teachers revealed that they have enough mugs, frames, and stuffed animals. They appreciate a gift card to places like Staples or Starbucks—or, even better, a thank you note. –Factretriever.com