In this roundtable, speakers offer brief overviews of their career paths that have landed them in faculty positions at independent high schools (both boarding and day schools) across the nation. As independent high schools come in many different forms, the panelists will discuss their decisions to pursue their line of work, their job searches, offer advice for attendees wondering if they might be a good fit for this profession, and explain how to start searching for opportunities, leaving ample time for open Q&A. These educators represent a wide range of experience, backgrounds, geographical locations, and academic institutions.

As the tenure-track professorship continually proves to be elusive to so many in its saturated job market, exposure to this adjacent career path can bolster morale: there is actually quite a bit of opportunity at the secondary level. Because graduate students rarely leave history–or history-related–programs with public school teaching certification, many don’t know that there is still a way to teach high school and potentially exercise a great deal of curricular freedom. Independent school teaching is a great option. For anyone who enjoys teaching, independent schools provide an opportunity to connect with students on multiple fronts and with far fewer geographical restrictions than one will face in the post-secondary job search. This roundtable, however, is not mere advertisement. Yes—we want people to know about this realm of work—but we want to have an honest and informative discussion about what careers at these schools can look like in terms of requirements, responsibilities, opportunities, and challenges.

This roundtable complements the AHA’s continued effort to amplify career diversity. It also follows up on conversations in many recent AHA meeting programs about bridging divides between K-12 and higher education. As studies of graduate students continue to indicate tremendous stress and declining mental health, disseminating and demystifying information about adjacent careers can imbibe current students (or historians looking for a career change) with some hope and arm them with valuable information. This will not be suitable work for everyone, but it is an avenue worth illuminating.