To tell my son he should do something that earns more than teaching

[NameChangeAgainAgainAgainAgain]

My son is good at everything. Parent's evening yesterday and all the teachers said he could easily get 9s at almost all his GCSEs but he's a bit lazy as he finds things quite easy.

He plays 2 instruments to grade 6+ standard. He learns fast. He's great at sciences, maths, computing.

He wants to be a PE teacher.

AIBU to tell him to think about doing something else? He could literally do anything and has chosen this. I am a bit disappointed I suppose, thought he might go Barrister/Actuary/Doctor or something.

A chief executive at one of the large colleges or school academy chains can earn £100,000+, and they all started at teachers. If he has a passion for teaching plus aptitude for numbers and data, then he’ll do well and climb the ranks quickly.

The thing is, he knows what a PE teacher does all day, maybe it's the familiarity of a known quantity that's appealing. It's staying in his current world.
I'd be encouraging him to widen his horizons generally, so that he meets other adults doing a variety of jobs and some of them earning much better money and with more autonomy than a PE teacher.
He may well change his mind in the next few years, but if he becomes a teacher for his first career, he'll gain plenty of transferable skills if he decides to change his mind. Lots of people teach for a few years and then change direction. But it's not great money compared to what he could get ,as say, an IT professional, an engineer, or something in the City. It's not that well respected, either, although there is a great deal of job satisfaction and long holidays in which to travel or pursue other interests.

hard hat on for the flaming.

You're not being unreasonable. It can be shit without enough money.

and teachers don’t earn enough money.

At the end of the day he’s got to do what he wants and there’s a line here, but definitely pointing out that he’s really capable of a lot more in terms of earnings and he should think carefully about his choices.

if he’s into sport he can do that in his leisure time.

if after you’ve talked it through with him he still wants to be a teacher then support him.

I read somewhere in the not too distant past that the av earnings for a barrister was £12, 500. They are self employed and not well paid at all unless they get the public enquiry /libel cases. So an average teacher is much better off than an average barrister.

That aside - it's not you who will be studying for and then working in these fields. Just because your DS is bright doesn't mean he has the aptitude for the law or medicine.

There's certainly no harm in talking through career options, and making sure your DS choses a wide range of GCSE keeping his options open. Please don't start manipulating him into a career he isn't suitable for or has an affinity with.

It's such a shame our culture looks down on teachers - they help shape the lives of the next generation.

For criminal barristers yes, this isn't too wide of the mark.
Everyone thinks barristers earn megabucks. And some absolutely do. Times 10.
But they're most typically in corporate law, not criminal law or family law. In criminal law a LOT of work is essentially unpaid and it can be relentlessly miserable dealing with some of the worst things that happen in society.
Barristers are also self employed, so it can be feast or famine. It can be a brilliant job but if you want guaranteed high wages and flexibility about hours, location, homeworking etc. then it's not it.

Tell him to fall in love with a rich girl while you're at it.

Honestly your daughter should think twice, a doctor's life is not good at present.

Thank you. I know that, and she knows that. She has talked to loads of doctors, read loads, shadowed loads etc. She is going in with her eyes as wide open as they can be, but I'm well aware that the knowledge of it being exhausting and incredibly stressful isn't the same as the lived experience. I've talked it through with her lots, but she is insistent that it's what she wants to do, regardless. I don't think I could stand in her way, even if I wanted to... which I don't.

At the end of the day, if she is really unhappy, she can leave the profession. Hard to do after all of that training and investment, I know, but not impossible. There are always other options!

Well if your son is lazy and work shy good luck with being a teacher. He won’t even get through teacher training

@Mirabai @Piggywaspushed My apologies. I had no RTFT, just the initial post.

As I'm sure you've noticed, the OP had hit a nerve implying that well-educated people cant/shouldn't be teachers. It is an attitude I find offensive, and I've come across it so many times that I've become rather sensitive to it.

When I was living in London, DH and I used to often go to dinners at various London clubs. I usually found that whoever I ended up sitting next to, we would chat about lots of different things. I was a post graduate student at the time and they often asked about my research. All members had attended Oxford or Cambridge. Later, going after I had become a teacher, if I mentioned my job people seemed to immediate downgrade how they viewed me and they talked about very trivial things or only matters relating to education. Several also assumed that I must just be there as a wide, rather than a member in my own right.

It's really annoying to KEEP coming across these attitudes and prejudices. I have become a little over sensitive to it.

It's so weird to me when people have a child, a whole other human with independent thoughts and feelings, and expect them to live their lives according to what they want.

Of course YABU. It's up to him what he does.

I wasn't bothered if you hadn't noticed the OP's second post. I defended you...

I think they are head of three subjects.

When DS was in Y9, he wanted to be a professional rugby player, by the time he got to Y11, he wanted to be a war correspondent and even checked out the territorial army.

When dd was in Y9, she wanted to be a nun, in Y10 a Dr, in yr11 and 12 it was drama school. She changed her mind at the start of Y13.

The both went to Oxford/Cambridge.

DS is an academic
DD is a secondary school teacher

Both trajectories could see them earning £100k in 10/15 years and offer good job security.

They change their minds @NameChangeAgainAgainAgainAgain

Not a QTS- the minimum salary is now £30k

I have had a similar conversation with my DC, achieved all 9’s, 8’s and 7’s at GCSE. Now taking Maths, computer science and science A levels. They were interested in becoming a Maths teacher and have a real passion for Maths. I work in a school so know the realities of being a teacher, also have a relative that is a teacher, and have tried to steer them away from teaching. Ultimately, they will do what they want and what makes them happy but there are a lot of other jobs that offer better pay and conditions with the talents that they have 🤷🏼‍♀️.

He might have changed his mind five times before he gets to uni.

DD dropped out of uni twice, which we didn’t expect. At 27 is now earning more than I did at the end of my full time teaching career. a job none of us had heard of when she was 16!

Wow. Rude and disrespectful on so many levels although I am sure your intentions are good. Never good to go down too tight a rabbit hole at a young age. Sounds as though he will do well whatever A levels he picks so leave him be. Maths and sciences useful for all manner of things. Music will be with him for life if he wants it. Push him too hard now and he will spring away.

I’m quite flummoxed by some of the replies on this thread to be honest- particularly about pay. Teaching is often a very hard, thankless job but I’m happy, I’m on 45K, in the North and not in a leadership role. Personally, I think I earn a pretty good wage for what I do and 13 weeks off a year!

The pay is crap but the stress of teaching is far, far worse. And getting worse still.
Avoid teaching full stop!

I think basing a career on money is a bit shallow. However, you should consider working conditions and quality of life. As a teacher I would not recommend he goes into teaching and I would discourage my own children. I have loved and hated my job over the years, I am currently enjoying it again but I'm got lucky with my new school. In many schools conditions are appalling right now.

@Snowdate
To be fair, it's about as hard to fail teacher training as it is to -insert really bloody difficult thing-.
The last two students I've mentored have been a very poor match for meeting teaching standards both in terms of capacity and attitude. It's so frustrating as teachers do feed problems with candidates back to the teacher training providers, but the mentors rarely want to know -there are big financial implications if a uni tries to fail a student, so universities are strongly invested in passing even the least suitable trainees. My current, final teaching practice student is surprising me daily with the chunks of missing subject knowledge, lack of awareness around assessment and general drive and initiative, and I'm a pretty dreamy tutor in terms of dedication to coaching and quality mentoring. But it's water of a duck's back.
So I disagree: it really is a rare teacher training student who doesn't pass their final placement, for better or for worse.

OP I totally get where you are coming from. I’m willing to bet the posters telling you that money doesn’t buy happiness are all older people who easily got a house, car and support a family based on ‘normal’ jobs years ago.

Today the situation is very different. Money DOES buy happiness if the wage you take home isn’t enough to buy/ rent a house and live a basic, boring comfortable life. Sadly, many jobs these days don’t offer enough to do this. Add in cost of living crisis, huge student debts to pay off, etc and you really need to be aiming for a better paid job just to get by.

I had absolutely no concept of wages and money and careers and what you actually need to live on when I was your son’s age. If someone had sat me down and explained that x career would lead to constant struggle, worrying about bills but y career would let me live well, afford to live a decent life and be debt free, I would have very much appreciated it.

Sadly, things have changed so much recently, and house prices are so ridiculous that you have to aim for traditionally high paying careers, whereas years ago, a ‘medium’ paying job would have done you fine.

He is your son, you obviously want the best for him, and don’t want him to struggle. You have the benefit of hindsight, he doesn’t. Yes, it’s his life, but guiding him into having a good life is no bad thing!

Just as an example of this, in my first job, quite a few years ago, I was able to buy my own house at 3x my salary. Recently, I saw that same house on sale and an equivalent wage earner today(wages have NOT increased at the same speed) would need to spend 12x their salary!! And that is without taking into account how much more debt young people have…