As public budgets have grown tighter over the past decade, states and school districts have sought ways to control the growth of spending. One increasingly common strategy employed to rein in costs is to offer experienced teachers with high salaries financial incentives to retire early. Although early retirement incentive (ERI) programs have been…

Principal Alison Harris is blunt in describing what she confronted on her arrival to Ranson IB Middle School in 2011. "I was placed in what many people would call an impossible situation," she says. During her initial visit to the school in 2009-10, she watched as students changed classes--while teachers pressed against the lockers to…

This bulletin is published as a much-need service to young men and women considering preparation for teaching. In it they will find information and judgments on duties, requirements, opportunities, satisfactions and annoyances in teaching as a life work. Because essential data has changed, the current report is written to describe the occupation…