I've always wanted to teach in the tertiary because they seem to have a very good academic life. I get to teach at my most convenient time, have more academic freedom, no spoon feeding students, less annoying parents to deal with. I've been grinding for the past 3 years to get my Master's Degree and now I'm the last leg of it. With that, I was given an opportunity to finally teach in the tertiary after 7 years of teaching in basic education.

My mum has been trying her best to convince me to enter public school. Unfortunately, it's not something I envisioned especially as someone who studied in a public high school. Our public school teachers are one of the most overworked and underpaid. Sure, there's job security and a relatively higher pay compared to private school teachers. However, not to generalize, when I look into their eyes most of them seem tired and jaded. Some are only in public schools for the money. Then there are those with a special talent to gaslight themselves that teaching in public schools is a purposeful and worthy endeavor despite the lack of support and the amount of labor and pay.

I've been with private schools for the longest time because I can teach better and comfortably with the supplies and the facilities they provide. I feel purpose. I am able to do more in private schools because I am enabled. Not to mention they also allocate funds for faculty development but I guess for them to provide facilities, supplies, and faculty development they have to keep the pay at an entry-level amount. Cons I encountered are power-tripping administrators and entitled parents and students who influence and/or coerce teachers to change their grade.

Now I'm teaching in a private tertiary institution. While I enjoy the academic life, I'm at risk of losing it because the pay they give me is only enough that if I trip I might lose it. What's worse is that there's less job security as the job is dependent on the number of loads and students, pay is nearly the same as entry level private school teachers, no work no pay during semestral breaks, no job security until I finish my Master's and get regularized. My contract ends this December and I'll be welcoming the new year without a job.

I'm scared to be unemployed for another month before I get a new contract in February. I'm now at that point that I'm considering to leave the academe for a while to focus on my finances and have more time for my grad school and finish it. I've already sent my application as a CSR to a company. I'm also considering to open a sandwich stand or become a bicycle delivery driver (but I heard there's a hold.) I'm scared of being unemployed again, even just for a month. I'm scared that the pay might be good and the job might relatively be easier that I might not leave it anymore and forget what I studied for.

Now that I'm looking for alternatives, I just feel so vulnerable. I don't think I'm qualified to do anything else other than to teach since I've never been to any other industries. When I tried service industry jobs I'm too qualified. It's all about skills acquisition now and boy do I have big respect for those who can do a lot of other things. Though at the same time they probably did because they have to in order to live.

Make passion your profession and you don't have to work for a day. I really love my teaching job and I am very passionate about it. I can talk hours on end expanding the same topic to different vantage points and then curate a lot of ideas. But I guess with how the world is turning to dream of such is now reserved for people with multiple safety nets.

It was easy to dream to become professionals when we were kids. Then, we become those professionals. We're handed a sheet of paper saying we're qualified to practice the dream we studied. Unfortunately, the diploma is not a guarantee that it will save your ass. With how tight the competition is in the job market today, we forget living the dream and we instead dream of living.