Skip's Edtech Jobs: October 28, 2023

Thank you for reading the EdSkipper, Skip’s newsletter about skipping from education to education-aligned careers. Every Saturday, I send out a list of curated remote jobs. Premium subscribers receive two additional emails a month with industry insights and advice to help you apply more competitively to the jobs you’re passionate about.

Last week, I sat down with one of my colleagues and friends in edtech, Holly Owens to talk about the skills educators need for their edskip.

If you don’t know Holly, I highly recommend following her on LinkedIn. She curates (mostly remote) US-Instructional Design jobs twice a week and always includes salaries!

Here are links to the audio and the video recordings!

What continues to resonate beyond the podcast is our discussion about upskilling.

As Holly mentioned, some jobs definitely require upskilling — not just building your skills but practicing them in real-world situations (volunteer, internships, etc). She’s an instructional designer and knows this side of things really well!

But we also talked about the darker side of upskilling — when it bleeds into imposter syndrome. I see this so frequently: educators underselling their skills.

I’ve talked about this on LinkedIn before. As Holly and I were talking, I was thinking about the specific skill I most frequently see educators undersell: our leadership experience. So many educators I talk to have led departments or committees, spearheaded new programming, and created real change in their buildings.

They usually call it ‘collaboration.’

But it’s leadership!

Let’s call it leadership!

~I hope you find some fantastic jobs to apply to this weekend,
Chelsea

Last Week’s Poll Results: What’s a fair minimum salary for a first edskip?

Love how many of you weighed in on last week’s poll!

Just a reminder, the assumption was that companies were looking for 3-5 years of experience. And the average educator salary (in 2020-21) was $62k; that same links highlights that the average educator has about 14 years experience.

Here are a few of the topics readers shared about their answer choices:

• Almost every comment included the same word: “inflation.” Cost-of-living increases are driving many salary increases but I’m still seeing a lot of entry-level edtech jobs that are paying the same rates they paid a few years ago. One reason? Tons of applicants. (How many? The Teacher Success position I posted last month had 1,250 applicants…)

• A number of people mentioned how geography factors in. There are some areas of the country were educators are making six figures (though that salary is still low compared to others in their geographic area), but where you live definitely impacts the salary range you’re looking for.

• Another person mentioned that salaries in edtech should be higher because companies work full-time in the summer. Such a good point! Historically, summers ‘off’ has been one justification for paying teachers less. (“Teachers only work 185 days a year” is what the business manager in my local school district used to say whenever teacher versus admin salary came up. Of course, we know there’s the difference between the days and hours teachers are PAID to work and they days and hours they ACTUALLY work…)

This Week’s Edtech and Education-Adjacent Jobs!