There is life – a working life that is – even after retirement and these 11 best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators prove exactly that.
Many retirees exchange the supposed easy, relaxing life in retirement to look for a second, albeit part-time, career for a variety of reasons. Most commonly, retirees take on new jobs to supplement their pensions. Others do it to save themselves from the utter boredom that they never expected to come with not working full time. Others, still, take on part-time work to give themselves the sense of purpose and routine that they were so used to in their careers.
Contrary to popular notions, there is actually a whole world of options for post-retirement work. There are high-paying ones, ones that give them a physical boost, and even ones that are fun – like the jobs listed among the 12 fun high paying part-time jobs for early retirees. Picking the right job, however, is crucial for a number of reasons. For instance, there is the issue of pension. US pension policies have restrictions on post-retirement income so they can’t really pick jobs with very high salaries. Working post-retirement also comes with potential financial risks. There is also the issue of physical demands of the job. Second, there is the issue of competency. Just like in any job market, some jobs are more especially suited for specific professionals.
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For former educators, the jobs that best suit them naturally involve social skills, management skills, communication skills, and of course – their teaching skills. Retired teachers and administrators, especially those that worked with younger students, are also best known for their patience that proves to be an asset in many work situations.
To come up with this list of the best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators, we have curated the most popular suggestions from a number of related articles and studies on the subject. We’ve taken suggestions from Chron Work, Reference, and The Guardian.
While it was easy to find the jobs to list, ranking them was an entirely different story. After all, what one person finds good may not exactly be the same as others. So as the main, and only, truly objective category applicable here (and really, the one criterion we can ALL agree on), we used the median hourly wage for each job as listed on Payscale, set only with the US as its location. Of course, the rates vary mostly on your location and your resume. The rates presented here are generic and do not specify tenure and qualifications but it is good enough a basis to check whether a job would be profitable for you or not.
It is for this reason that one of the most popular suggestions on our sources did not make it to the list of the best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators: international teaching. It is, in our opinion, one of the best if not the best post-retirement careers any former teacher or administrator can pick. I mean, any job that involves traveling and being paid to live in a foreign country takes the top spot for us hands down. And the options are not few and far in between either: Asian countries like China and Thailand, as well as many locations in Europe open and the Middle East open their doors for teachers especially for teachers of English.
However, there is a huge difficulty in figuring out the median wage for this job so there is no way to objectively rank it the way we have ranked the rest of the entries in this article. So we’ll leave international teaching hereabouts, letting you know that this is an excellent option for teachers and administrators post-retirement and it is well-worth researching by country.
Now, let’s move on to the rest of this list of the 11 best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators!
11. School Office Staff
Median hourly wage: $13 per hour
This is the job for people who want to stay slightly busy and remain within the school environment. The pay is not really substantial but getting the job is rather easy for former teachers and administrators because of the pre-existing connections in the district.
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9. Freelance Virtual Assistant
Median hourly wage: $15 per hour
With the existence of online work platforms like Upwork, working from home has been made not just possible but easy. There is a range of jobs that retired teachers and administrators can choose from – from proofreading and editing jobs to customer service jobs to administrative jobs, and even teaching jobs. In most cases, they can clock in as many hours as they can.
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9. Researcher
Median hourly wage: $15 per hour
This covers both marketing and user experience researcher jobs. What makes this a popular option on the list of the best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators is the fact that former teachers are already equipped with the analytic, social, and management skills required to carry this job out. And should the job require surveys, former educators have strong persuasion powers to convince people into taking part in their survey.
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8. Office Manager
Median hourly wage: $16 per hour
If one can manage dozens of unruly children alongside endless paperwork for at least 20 years on a daily basis, a part-time job managing an office and its needs should be child’s work.
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7. Private Tutor
Median hourly wage: $16 per hour
This is perhaps one of the most obvious job options around for retired educators. Aside from the job at hand being something that they are best at doing, retired teachers and educators will find so much easier to advertise their services with the connections they have at the school. Higher rates can be expected at exam preparation tutorial services.
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6. Corporate Training
Median hourly wage: $18 per hour
Corporate training, though not as easily available a job as tutoring, still makes it among the top options for retired teachers mainly because the job involves something that they are so adept at. Compared to non-profit skill transfer, corporate training is more complex and, understandably, has a better pay.
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5. Human Resource Officer
Median hourly wage: $19 per hour
It may sound like a job that’s a world apart from teaching but, believe it or not, retired teachers and administrators make good human resource officers. Teachers, with decades worth of experience managing kids, communicating with their parents, and even managing other educators, have the necessary skills to help manage a company’s human resource department. They would do great at organizing team building activities, addressing employee issues and speaking with them about it, and even studying applicants.
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4. Online English Tutor
Median hourly wage: $20 per hour
With much of the world still yearning to learn English, the internet has become a huge market for online English tutors. And the internet has also made it a whole lot easier for tutors and potential students to connect! Former educators can choose to do it freelance or make use of the services of the countless online tutorial platforms available. The students can range from kids to teenagers to adults and can come from anywhere in the world. The great part about this job, aside from the pay, is the fact that it does not require any experience as English teacher or being a teacher at all. This job gives a premium on native English speakers, and having a background in education is a huge plus (and a huge salary increase potential).
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3. Substitute Teacher
Median hourly wage: $20.71 per hour
The biggest benefit of this job that ranked third on our list of best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators is perhaps its easy acquisition. All it requires is connections with one’s former school and the willingness to actually get back into the classroom to teach. The biggest downside to it, however, is that it is not as easily available as most other part-time jobs listed here.
2. Adjunct Professor
Median hourly wage: $36 per hour
Working as an adjunct professor at a local university or college is a win-win situation for any retired teacher or administrator who wishes to stay in academia but deal with more mature students and work fewer hours with better pay.
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1. Education Consultant
Median hourly wage: $51 per hour
The National American University describes the job of an education consultant as “drives the entire admissions process at the campus level.” The major purpose is to recruit, qualify and enroll new students into our programs.” However, this is not the only thing that an education consultant can do. Being a consultant can include working with the school board on improving student services, academic concerns, and even working with parents and students in helping them secure a spot at a coveted college or university. Basically, an education consultant is one who is an expert at the ins and outs of the educational process – and theoretically, someone with more than several decades of experience within the institution should fit that description well. It also helps that you have the work connections to add to your already massive and impressive resume!
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So there you have it, folks! Whether you’re retiring soon or are already in the retirement group, these are your options for the 11 best part-time jobs for retired teachers and administrators! Have anything to add to this conversation? Leave us your comments below!
