---
title: "Middle School Teacher"
description: "Teach one or more subjects to students at the middle, intermediate, or junior high school level."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/middle-school-teacher"
last-updated: "2026-08-23T15:56:39.581Z"
---

# Middle School Teacher

**Category:** Educational Instruction and Library · **SOC code:** 25-2022 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 25-2022.00

Teach one or more subjects to students at the middle, intermediate, or junior high school level.

Also advertised as: Art Teacher; English Teacher; Language Arts Teacher (LA Teacher); Math Teacher (Mathematics Teacher); Middle School Teacher; Music Teacher; PE Teacher (Physical Education Teacher); Science Teacher.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $64,370 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** Not published by BLS
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $48,080 to $102,540, with the middle half between $58,530 and $80,490
- **Total US employment:** 620,090
- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's
- **Preparation required:** Medium preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** -2.0% over 2024–2034 (BLS EP, 2024–2034)
- **Annual job openings:** 40,500 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 46/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 620,090 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $48,080 |
| 25th | $58,530 |
| 50th (median) | $64,370 |
| 75th | $80,490 |
| 90th | $102,540 |
| Mean (average) | $72,030 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| WA | $102,140 | $95,446 | 10,510 |
| CA | $98,950 | $89,370 | 37,300 |
| NY | $94,840 | $87,879 | 38,670 |
| CT | $93,610 | $90,348 | 7,920 |
| RI | $92,760 | $90,692 | 2,370 |
| MA | $89,450 | $84,581 | 16,570 |
| DC | $79,900 | $72,702 | 1,540 |
| UT | $79,180 | $80,090 | 5,960 |
| AK | $78,940 | $77,121 | 1,150 |
| NJ | $78,770 | $72,396 | 23,650 |
| MD | $78,510 | $74,801 | 14,530 |
| OR | $78,350 | $75,802 | 6,940 |
| PA | $77,930 | $79,869 | 22,720 |
| OH | $77,090 | $83,094 | 30,450 |
| IL | $76,110 | $76,142 | 24,770 |

38 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 53 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/middle-school-teacher/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/middle-school-teacher.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 633,700 in the 2024–2034 base year to 621,300 by the end of the cycle — a loss of 12,400 jobs, or -2.0%. Declining: -2.0% against 3.1% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 40,500 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2024–2034.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Bachelor's degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Medium preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Four: Considerable Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** None.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Bachelor's Degree | 66.9% |
| Post-Baccalaureate Certificate | 21.3% |
| Less than a High School Diploma | 9.6% |
| Master's Degree | 2.2% |

## What the work involves

- Observe and evaluate students' performance, behavior, social development, and physical health.
- Establish and enforce rules for behavior and procedures for maintaining order among students.
- Establish clear objectives for all lessons, units, and projects, and communicate these objectives to students.
- Enforce all administration policies and rules governing students.
- Assign lessons and correct homework.
- Prepare materials and classrooms for class activities.
- Confer with parents or guardians, other teachers, counselors, and administrators to resolve students' behavioral and academic problems.
- Meet or correspond with parents or guardians to discuss children's progress and to determine priorities and resource needs.

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Learning Strategies — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Reading Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Instructing — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Social Perceptiveness — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Persuasion — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- Education and Training — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- English Language — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Philosophy and Theology — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Mathematics — importance 3.7 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Computers and Electronics — importance 3.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Expression — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Problem Sensitivity — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Information Ordering — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Social (S), Artistic (A), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| S — Social | 7.00 |
| A — Artistic | 4.10 |
| C — Conventional | 3.56 |
| I — Investigative | 3.31 |
| E — Enterprising | 2.66 |
| R — Realistic | 2.59 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| ESFP | 72.6 |
| ENFJ | 71.9 |
| ENFP | 71.7 |
| ESFJ | 64.9 |
| INFJ | 64.6 |

Best-fitting types: ESFP, ENFJ, ENFP.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [High School Teacher](https://nuecareer.com/careers/high-school-teacher) — median $72,040
- [Elementary School Teacher](https://nuecareer.com/careers/elementary-school-teacher) — median $63,970
- [Adult Basic Education, Adult Secondary Education, and English as a Second Language Instructor](https://nuecareer.com/careers/adult-basic-education-adult-secondary-education-and-english-as-a-second-language-instructor) — median $61,540
- [Tutor](https://nuecareer.com/careers/tutor) — median $43,350
- [Kindergarten Teacher](https://nuecareer.com/careers/kindergarten-teacher) — median $62,680
- [Special Education Teacher, Middle School](https://nuecareer.com/careers/special-education-teacher-middle-school) — median $66,810
- [Special Education Teacher, Secondary School](https://nuecareer.com/careers/special-education-teacher-secondary-school) — median $74,260
- [Career/Technical Education Teacher, Middle School](https://nuecareer.com/careers/career-technical-education-teacher-middle-school) — median $65,030
- [Special Education Teacher, Elementary School](https://nuecareer.com/careers/special-education-teacher-elementary-school) — median $67,170
- [Special Education Teacher, Kindergarten](https://nuecareer.com/careers/special-education-teacher-kindergarten) — median $67,170

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 30.3 Database, May 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2024–2034. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BLS OOH** — BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook, 2024–2034 edition. https://www.bls.gov/ooh/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 30.3 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/middle-school-teacher