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In almost every country, teaching in a state school requires a university degree, a period of supervised classroom practice, and a government license or registration. The packaging differs: a four-year Bachelor of Education, a subject degree plus a training year like England's PGCE, or a master's degree as in Finland. Private and international schools sometimes hire without local licensure, but the degree requirement is nearly universal.

Typically four to six years after secondary school: a three- or four-year degree, one to two years of teacher training and supervised practice, then a probation or induction period of one to two years before full licensure. Finland's standard route runs about five to six years because a master's degree is mandatory; some fast-track programs place career changers in classrooms within months, with training alongside.

It varies more by country than almost any comparable profession. Luxembourg's statutory scales, the OECD's highest, climb above €120,000; German teachers commonly earn €55,000–€85,000 with civil-servant status; the US average was about $72,000 in 2023–24 per the NEA; England's main scale ran roughly £32,000–£49,000 in 2024–25; and low-fee private schools in India may pay under ₹20,000 a month.

UNESCO estimated in 2023 that the world needs 44 million additional teachers by 2030, about 15 million of them in sub-Saharan Africa, where student numbers are growing fastest. In wealthier countries the problem is attrition and recruitment rather than demographics: roughly 8% of US teachers leave the profession each year, and shortages concentrate in physics, mathematics, computing and special education.

Parts of the job are already automating: routine grading, drafting worksheets, drill practice and administrative reporting. But the core of classroom teaching — motivating thirty real children, managing behavior, noticing which quiet pupil stopped understanding on Tuesday, and carrying legal safeguarding duties — has no automated substitute. Most systems are deploying AI tutors as a homework layer under a human teacher, not in place of one.

The Varkey Foundation's Global Teacher Status Index, which surveyed 35 countries in 2018, ranked China first — respondents there compared teachers to doctors — with Malaysia and Taiwan close behind, while several European countries ranked teachers nearer to social workers or librarians. Finland is the standard case where selectivity drives prestige: primary-teacher programs admit roughly one applicant in ten and require a master's degree.