Job Discussion Forums

[cwc]

Firefighters and Doctors Viewed
As Most Prestigious Occupations

THE WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE
July 26, 2006

Americans view firefighters and doctors as having the most prestigious professions, according to a recent Harris Interactive poll.

When read a list of different occupations, 63% of respondents to the telephone poll said they feel firefighters have "very great" prestige, while 58% said doctors do. Other professions that were seen as having very great prestige included: nurses (55%), scientists (54%), teachers (52%) and military officers (51%).

The occupations seen by the fewest people as having very great prestige were: real-estate brokers (6%), stockbrokers (11%), business executives (11%), actors (12%), union leaders (12%) and journalists (12%).

Actors were seen by the largest percentage of people (37%) as having "hardly any prestige at all," followed by real-estate brokers at 32%.

Harris Interactive has been asking about the prestige of different professions and occupations since 1977. Over the course of that time, teaching is the only occupation that has seen an increase in prestige, rising 23 percentage points to 52% since 1977.

Lawyers have seen the greatest decrease in very great prestige, down 15 percentage points to 21%. Scientists have slipped 12 percentage points to 54%, and business executives have fallen seven percentage points to 11%.

[Calories]

And why is this important?

[thrifty]

They mean real teachers not TEFLers.

[mondrian]

[thrifty]

Do you really think that when they asked 'man on the street' for opinions about teachers, he was thinking about TEFLers?

[TheLongWayHome]

Just found out I've been a fake teacher all these years.

[Glenski]

I go along with part of thrifty's thinking. When someone says "teacher" to you, you usually think of a person teaching regular topics to the regular student body, not to the ESL community in your home country or to EFL students abroad.

As for not being a "real teacher", I take issue with that, too, but that is not the point here.

[cwc]

[denise]

I certainly consider myself a real teacher. If others don't see me or themselves that way, that's their problem.

It's nice to know that there are people out there who respect what we do!

d

[rusmeister]

We ARE 'real' teachers. Some of you may need the self-affirmation, but having been a veteran public school teacher I can tell you that the people with certificates sitting in the teachers lounges complaining are not necessarily better or harder-working than any of us professional TEFLers.
If you are working full-time and busting your b*** to teach people English then you are at least learning the craft on-the-job, which is all the public school certified (or 'emergency-certified') are doing.

Don't worry about respect. We're all jerks, we all make mistakes while getting paid for it. Just do the best you can to justify the money you make. You ARE teachers.

(Speech, speech! Ooh!)

[thrifty]

[Mr. Kalgukshi]

If there's anyone out there thinking they can derail or hijack this thread, you are wrong.

In fact, you will be gone before this thread is gone.

Stick to the topic is my suggestion.

The topic is not about who and who is not a "real" teacher.

[Gregor]

MOD EDIT
I don't know what those of you who don't think of yourself as a real teacher actually do in class, but if I describe my job honestly to the man-on-the-street pretty much anywhere in America, I would likely get MORE respect than a public school teacher would. I've been a student in American grammar and high schools and university. I know what teachers have to deal with. It's pretty similar to my job, plus the fact that I'm a foreigner, and I'm peacefully spreading a pertty significant portion of my culture to other places and doing it in such a way as to have the people I am teaching glad that I'm doing it.

The OP very much pertains to me, and I appreciate reading it.

MOD EDIT

[Stephen Jones]

Respect is normally in inverse relation to salary.

[Calories]