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For those who are unfamiliar, student teaching is the final step that a student goes through before becoming a certified teacher. It is a semester-long experience (18 weeks) in which a student works hands-on in a classroom, paired up with that classroom’s current educator. The experiences vary greatly depending on which educator the student is paired with, as I’ve heard some student teachers were thrown into teaching lessons right from the start, while others were given a couple of weeks to ease into taking on almost full responsibility of the classroom.
This experience itself is invaluable and allows students to work through classroom responsibilities while having several support systems in place. The problem? This is a full-time job that the student is not paid to complete. In fact, in many cases, you are paying a fee to student teach; not to mention the additional fees to take required tests for licensure.
I will preface my stance with this: I have not yet student taught. My information comes from student teachers who are in the process or were in the process of becoming teachers, both from Lawrence and elsewhere.
Firstly, I’d like to talk about a friend of mine, who I will call “A.” She was not a Lawrence student, and while she was a student teacher, she was fortunate enough to be living with her family rent-free. That said, to cover the expenses of living, she would go straight from her 7:30 a.m.–3:30 p.m. day of teaching to her 4 p.m.–8 p.m. cashiering job every night, plus 16-or-more-hour workdays on the weekends. She shared with me that, despite living in a rent-free space, she struggled with payments, including her loans and living expenses. She always had ideas for fun projects for the kids, but due to working at a low-income school and having no expenses to spare herself, she wasn’t able to execute these ideas in the classroom.
A is one of millions of people who go into teaching. The uninformed non-teacher may think, “Well, that sucks, but they still have personal time during non-school hours.” Unfortunately, much of the work for a classroom happens outside of it. Student teachers not only are teaching lessons; they are attending parent-teacher meetings, sometimes attending a support class, creating lesson plans, grading papers, etc. Without being paid for this work, any time not spent on student teaching responsibilities will be spent doing other work, such as retail in the case of A, to make up for this. Don’t forget, most students going into student teaching also have loans to pay off, and most are not fortunate enough to have free housing. I once asked a Lawrence student teacher how they balanced their social life with the responsibilities of working and student teaching, and they simply said that they didn’t. It wasn’t possible because of finances.
Whilst I have not yet student taught, I have done work as a substitute paraprofessional. Some of my duties included one-on-one instruction, recess management, office work and assisting the staff and faculty as needed. This job, where I worked four-or-so-hour shifts, left me socially and physically exhausted. I made around $15 an hour. Student teachers have more responsibilities than what I had as a para and are only paid in experience.
Student teachers receiving compensation is not a new concept. There has been talk of passing legislation that would allow stipends to be given to student teachers in Wisconsin. According to the Wisconsin State Journal, at the end of 2024, Superintendent Jill Underly proposed that all student-teachers in Wisconsin receive upwards of $10,000 to cover living expenses and reduce debt for teachers. This was in response to several teachers leaving Wisconsin or the profession as a whole. Other states that already have a stipend program in place include Maryland, Colorado and Michigan. While several other education issues were discussed, this took the forefront going into the 2025–26 school year.
As a future educator, I urge action and awareness of this issue, and I appreciate every educator who has come before me and the sacrifices they have made to teach. Payment for student teachers would reduce the dire need for educators by making certification more accessible and create better living conditions for educators even after they are certified. Not to mention, without the need to work so many hours outside of student teaching, the focus goes back where it should be: the students.