non dual teachers consider a teaching job a safe heaven and for many reason, it is. Schools and colleges are not a part of the normal economic parameters. Inflation, recession, depression do not have a direct impact on them. In some sense, they are recession proof but there is catch an educational institute should establish and gain repute before it comes in the safe category.
How many teachers can actually find teaching jobs in such institutes, since the institutes are limited so are the job opportunities.
Teachers salary is another thing of concern, some teachers especially in the higher education get decent salaries but if your teaching job is not in the A Grade category then there could be a problem. Teacher exploitation is another big concern and most of the teachers would be aware of it. There are plenty of horror stories of the exploitation and they are not limited to private institute, state, and government run institutes are a part of it.
Teachers pay may be decent but it certainly is not blazing, and their is a ceiling limit to the earning of a teacher, unfortunately expenses do not wait for the teacher salary to get incremented before they can rise. No wonder so many of teachers look for additional income avenues and second jobs.
Is there an option teachers have that looks beyond a teaching job? Yes, there is and the teachers can try most of these options without leaving their jobs to begin with. Once the income factor from these options is satisfactory then teachers can decide their future course.
You will be surprised to know the grants that are available for the education. I personally know teachers and educators who have received grants for developing lessons, lesson plans, education systems and educational games. The Grant runs in millions of dollars and it is not only the government who is giving it .International organizations like United Nations and private organizations including corporate and many philanthropist including Bill Gates have a grant program . What you need is the right idea in the right direction. The grants are available for genuine causes and for things that service the society. Thousands of avenues are available where Grants are available maybe you can get into one of them.
Donations
Well it is certainly not a dirty word or anything to be ashamed about, if you would notice many Websites and Blogs now carry a donation link. If you are doing something worthwhile and not charging money for it there are plenty of people who are ready to donate for a worthy cause. In some cases, donations were the forerunners of the grants given.
Merchandising
Good quality lessons, lesson plans, notes, books, papers, games in the digital format are very much in demand. Many teachers who simply made good power point presentations and documents (Word/PDF) are selling it on Internet and earning some mind-boggling incomes. If I were to reveal some of these incomes, most readers would not believe it. The good thing about digital products is that do not have to sell it directly. You do not even need a Website or Blog to sell it. Many service providers on the net accept your product and sell it on your behalf to the world. You can compare it to writing a book and submitting it to publisher who does the rest of the job. Unlike print publishers, the digital product selling sites are not that finicky and open to many things and ideas. If you are good at developing educational products in digital format, you should definitely try this one out. You never know you may be the next millionaire on the block.
Renting Royalty
This one requires little more effort than the previous one; it still involves making digital products but you need to have a collection, a mini library of digital teaching resources before you can begin. Once your digital library is ready, you can give the entire library to educational institutes on royalty basis. The educational institute and even private education companies are hungry for such libraries. One good idea is once you start developing digital product you can begin with merchandising and once it develops into a collection you can proceed to rent it out, you can also create a library as joint venture between several teachers and income then are distributed. Believe me this may sound difficult but once you do it you have a life long passive income for you and the magical thing is you can rent the same library out to multiple institutes. The incomes from this well I think you can add up the numbers yourself. I do not want to shock you.
