How is the teacher job market in the Austin, TX area?

[Wedge]

Hey Everyone,

I am moving to Austin in a few weeks and my wife needs to find a job.  She is an elementary school teacher and I was wondering how the job market is for teachers in the area.  Shortage?  Surplus?  Who is hiring?  What districts are good and what are bad?

Thanks

[DigMe]

I've heard it's good and they pay relatively good.  Just hearsay.

brad cook

[Wedge]

Thanks.  Any Austin teachers in the house?

[auschip]

Kinda, my wife is substitute teaching currently.  She has her secondary teaching certificate (6th-12th), but there isn't as much of a demand for English as some of the other disciplines.  Schools to stay away from or go to depend on the area.  I don't want my wife teaching at AISD again, but again elementary might be better then her school.  

Eanes ISD (Westlake) is good, and so is Lake Travis (LTISD).  What side of town are you going to be living?  Other schools are Dripping Springs, Georgetown, Cedar Park, and Round Rock.

[JAlexander]

I'm not a teacher, although I'm going to start subbing in the fall.  However, I have a friend who's a teacher and he tells me that the Bastrop school system is pretty good.  Pay scale is at http://www.bastrop.isd.tenet.edu/depts/humanres/salary.htm and it's apparently pretty standard for this area.

Hope that helps.

James

[crt360]

Im not a teacher, but I used to live in Austin (still pretty close).  I suspect there is someone else around here who can help you a lot more than I can, but here are some links you can check out:

A listing of and websites for the Austin elementary schools:
http://www.austinisd.org/schools/campus.phtml?opt=bylevel&slevel=elementary

AISD listings:
http://www.austinisd.org/inside/hr/searchresults.phtml

AISD salary info:
http://www.austinisd.org/inside/hr/salary.phtml

Like auschip said, a lot depends on the area.

I imagine any of the schools in the Eanes and Lake Travis ISDs would be pretty good choices, but there's probably a longer line for those jobs.

[Wedge]

We'll probably be living on the north side of town.  What didn't you like about your wife working AISD?

[auschip]

At the time she was working for a school in East Austin that charitably could be called "severely disadvantaged".  They found 6th graders having oral sex in the hall ways.  A woman was raped in the field outside of the school. When she had to go there on the weekends to get work done, I would need to go with her, and like most places it is a victim disarmament zone.   She was in a portable building (read trailer), and often times would have people looking in at her on the weekends (the reason I started going with her).  

Not all schools in AISD are bad, but that experience and the lack of support from the school management soured her on AISD.  On the North side of Austin she could even drive to Georgetown if she wanted.

[Wedge]

Hey Auschip, I have heard pretty awful things about east austin.  I am glad your wife came out of it okay.  My wife really doesn't want to work in a big city school district, she did some student teaching at some pretty rough schools and doesn't really want to repeat that again.  The schools weren't really as bad as the neighborhoods they were in.  I'll know exactly where I am living in about 10 days after I go down and find a place to live.