What Jobs in Education Are There Outside of the Classroom? A Former Teacher’s Breakdown
Last month, I met my former teaching coworker Lila for coffee after her half-day of subbing at our old middle school. She slumped into the booth across from me, pulled off her scuffed white sneakers, and propped her swollen feet on the empty chair next to her. A first-grader’s glittery gold star sticker was stuck to the side of her canvas tote, and crumbs from her blueberry muffin scattered across the table when she pulled out her phone. “I can’t keep doing this,” she said, blowing on her oat milk latte. “I love kids, I love education, but I can’t handle 27 seventh graders in a room for 6 hours a day, every day. Are there even any jobs in education outside the classroom that are actually worth it?”
I get that question all the time. When I quit my classroom job three years ago, half my extended family assumed I was leaving education entirely to do something corporate. I didn’t blame them. Most people only interact with the teachers standing in front of their kid’s class, so that’s all they think education jobs are. But the truth is, most of the work that makes learning possible happens out of the daily classroom spotlight.
For me, that work is writing curriculum for a small non-profit that makes free after-school program materials for low-income neighborhoods. Most weeks, I spend a day or two out at different programs, talking to kids and group leaders to see what activities actually hold their attention, cut out the fancy supplies most programs can’t afford, and adjust lessons to fit different age ranges. Last week, I tested a new nature scavenger hunt I wrote for 4th graders, and a group of kids crowded around me to show me the three different oak leaves they’d found; one kid even pulled a spiky-shelled acorn out of his pocket that he’d never seen before. That same rush I used to get when a kid finally got how to structure a thesis statement? I felt that right there. But I don’t leave work with 12 essays to grade over the weekend, I don’t get parent emails at 9:30 at night, and I don’t have to rewrite my entire year of plans because the district switched curricula last minute.
I know dozens of other people doing meaningful education work outside the classroom, too. My friend Mia, who also left the classroom five years ago, is a youth program coordinator at our local public library. She plans the summer reading challenge, runs monthly STEM workshops for middle schoolers, and trains teen volunteers to help with after-school homework help. She still interacts with kids every week, but her load is spread out across different programs, and she doesn’t have to manage daily behavior plans or fill out state-mandated progress reports. My cousin James has a teaching license but never wanted to lead a class; he works as an edtech support specialist for our local school district. He drives to different elementary schools every day, helps teachers set up new learning apps, troubleshoots broken kid tablets, and runs small training sessions for new staff. He says he gets to problem-solve all day, which he loves, and he still gets to pop into classrooms and say hi to kids, without the full-time responsibility of running one. My next-door neighbor works as a parent educator for the local early childhood coalition. She runs free weekly workshops for new parents on everything from encouraging toddler speech to handling tantrums, and answers one-on-one questions for parents who don’t have anywhere else to turn. None of these people are classroom teachers, but every single one works in education.
If you’re a burnt-out teacher like Lila, or a parent whose kid is interested in education but doesn’t want to lead a classroom, there are concrete, low-friction steps you can take to explore these roles. First, if you want to test the waters without quitting your current job, sign up to volunteer for a few hours a month with a local education-focused non-profit, library, or museum. That lets you see what the work is actually like before you make a switch. If you already have a teaching license, start by checking the “support services” or “administration” tab on your local district’s job board—most districts have open roles for instructional coaches, library media technicians, curriculum specialists, and attendance coordinators that only require your existing license, no extra degrees. If you’re browsing job boards, stop only searching for “teaching jobs” — try searching terms like “community education”, “youth program coordinator”, “curriculum developer”, or “education outreach” to pull up roles that aren’t advertised in the K-12 teaching section. For parents with high school kids exploring career paths, just send a quick email to your local library or education non-profit to ask about a half-day shadowing opportunity; most places are happy to let a teen see what the job is really like.
Lila left coffee that day saying she was going to pull up the district job board that night. She’d been curious about the open library media tech role at the middle school down the street from her house, a role that only requires a teaching license and lets you help kids find books and run the after-school book club, no daily whole-group teaching. I haven’t gotten a final update yet, but last week she sent me a screenshot of a summer program coordinator posting, asking what I thought of the job description. It’s still up in the air, and that’s okay. Most people don’t talk about the fact that education is a huge field, and it doesn’t only need people who want to stand in front of a classroom full of kids every single day. You can care deeply about helping kids learn and grow, and still need a role that fits your boundaries, your energy, and what you actually want out of work. That doesn’t make you any less of an educator.
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