The Pros and Cons of Being a Principal: An Honest Look
The pros and cons of being a principal come down to reach versus distance: you shape a whole building's culture and earn a median $105,870, but you trade classroom relationships for evaluations, budgets, and every conflict that walks through your door. Most principals start as teachers and miss the room.
If you've been teaching a few years, somebody has probably already asked whether you've thought about administration. It's a fair question, and it's a harder decision than it looks from inside a classroom. The pros and cons of being a principal are worth working through before you enroll in a leadership program, not after.
Assuming you already have your bachelor's degree in education, a teaching license, and have spent a handful of years teaching in the classroom, you can start taking the steps it takes to become a principal.
The next step is to start earning an advanced degree in school administration, pass your state's credentialing exam, and obtain a license for school administrators as required by your state.
Even after you check all the boxes for the education and credentialing process, you better have the right disposition for the job too, and the right soft skills too.
Most teachers will tell you that a good principal…
- Knows staff as people and makes team members feel valued and appreciated
- Sets clearly defined expectations
- Is able to have difficult conversations while remaining kind
- Holds people accountable without being demoralizing
- Is a physical presence in hallways, cafeterias, classrooms, commons areas, and at events
- Always knows what's going on in the building
- Looks at issues from as many perspectives as possible
If that's not enough, they're also humble, approachable, measured, trustworthy, have great delegation skills, and are great communicators.
Sounds easy, right?
What the Job Costs You
Here's the part the job posting leaves out. A classroom hands you small wins all week: the kid who finally gets long division, the reluctant reader asking for a second book. Step into the office and those moments belong to somebody else. You hear about them secondhand, if at all.
Evaluations change too. Sitting through your own is uncomfortable. Writing someone else's is worse, especially when it's a colleague you taught beside for six years and the honest version isn't the kind one. You'll have that conversation more than once.
Then there's everything that escalates. A teacher handles the disagreements that stay inside one room. A principal handles the ones that outgrew every room: the phone calls, the discipline decisions nobody is happy with, the meeting scheduled for 4:30 on a Friday. Budget season arrives whether or not spreadsheets are your thing.
| What changes | As a teacher | As a principal |
|---|---|---|
| Reach | One roster of students | Every student and staff member in the building |
| Daily wins | You watch them happen | You hear about them secondhand |
| Evaluations | You receive them | You write and deliver them |
| Conflict | Stays inside your room | Arrives once it has outgrown the room |
| Calendar | Summers off | Year-round, with a lighter July |
None of that is a reason to stay out of administration. It's a reason to walk in with your eyes open, because the teachers who struggle most in the role are the ones who took it expecting a bigger version of the job they already had.
The Pay Bumps and Other Perks of Becoming a Principal
Becoming a principal means assuming a role that in certain ways combines the key aspects of every job within the school's walls. Principals have traditionally worked all summer, but some states are now trading as much as eight weeks off (typically June and July!) in exchange for less frequent pay increases.
Salary
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, education administrators at the kindergarten through secondary level earned a median annual wage of $105,870 as of May 2025, across 328,330 positions nationally. The spread is wide, and it tracks district size and years in the chair more than anything else.
| Measure | Annual wage (May 2025) |
|---|---|
| Median | $105,870 |
| Mean | $116,100 |
| 75th percentile | $134,630 |
| 90th percentile | $167,770 |
One thing the table won't tell you: principals typically work a longer contract year than the teachers they supervise, so comparing the two salaries straight across overstates the size of the jump. Divide by days worked before you decide the raise is life-changing.
Healthcare
The predominant model for healthcare coverage mirrors what school districts offer the teachers in their ranks, with benefits covering between 79% and 84% of the total annual cost of the plan.
Pension
Depending on the state and hiring date, many school administrators retire with a state pension plan, often referred to as a defined benefit plan. In simplest terms, while you work you pay in, and when you no longer work, you are paid based on a prescribed formula.
Some states are starting to move toward a privatized retirement plan such as a 401k. Though the mechanisms are different, the basic idea and end result are the same: security in retirement.
Free Professional Development
There are still districts out there that provide administrators with a budget for professional development that's distributed to the building's administrative team.
With so much at stake these days, and with the methods and technology changing and evolving all the time, administrative teams need to keep the pedal to the floor when it comes to their learning and professional development, now more than ever.
Reimbursement for Continuing Education Expenses
Tuition reimbursement programs offer an opportunity for obtaining college credits toward a specific advanced degree program.
In all likelihood, you'll meet the qualifications for an administrator position in your district by earning a master's degree in education administration, so it's more likely than not that if you're ambitious enough to take the next step, it's an EdD or PhD in Education that you'll be pursuing. It's a valuable education to have, and it will make you invaluable to the district you work for. That's something districts are often more than happy to invest in.
Bonus Pay
Bonus pay can be an occasional perk for principals. Based on student and teacher performance, some districts incentivize school leaders in order to reach certain benchmarks.
The Intangible Rewards Speak for Themselves
Anybody working in education in any capacity knows that our wealth is rooted in our passion for teaching and learning.
We want to leave a legacy that takes time to build. Investing in the lives of kids is no easy task but being present for a former student's inauguration into public office, seeing a nurse at a hospital who smiles as he recalls your words of encouragement, or running across a former student with a troubled upbringing who was always in your office but beat the odds to go on to lead a happy, successful life…well, there's just no feeling quite like it.
As a veteran teacher of two-plus decades, I can tell you that being a school principal is no cakewalk. Having spent seven years as a building administrator at a Midwest K-8 school, I did more than strut around the building drinking coffee and feeling important.
Building administrators are the leaders of the building. They set the tone for the school's culture and climate. Faculty, staff, and students draw from the energy and expectations they set.
For years I called myself a "recovering middle school administrator," and while it sounds negative, it's quite the opposite. In all honesty, I miss the joy of it. Yes, the work is challenging, and while the days can be long, there is an intrinsic reward in knowing that what your team is doing MATTERS in the lives of students.
Administrators are at the forefront of new ideas in education, technology, government policies, trends, and just about everything else.
School administrators are important figures and real leaders in the broader communities they serve. During times of crises, communities look to their schools for a sense of normalcy and for assurance that no matter what might be going on in the world, school is still open, and everything's going to be okay.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do you have to be a teacher before becoming a principal?
In most states, yes. Classroom experience is a common prerequisite for an administrator credential, and the number of years required varies by state. Your state's educator-licensing or credentialing agency sets that figure, so check it there rather than assuming a national standard applies.
What degree do you need to become a principal?
A master's degree in educational leadership or education administration is the usual starting point, though the specific degree titles a state will accept vary. Some administrators go on to an EdD or PhD, but that's rarely required for a building-level job.
How much more do principals make than teachers?
Education administrators at the K-12 level earned a median $105,870 as of May 2025, according to BLS data. Compare that against your own salary schedule rather than a national teacher median, and account for the longer contract year before you calculate the difference.
Is being a principal worth it?
That depends on what you'd miss. If daily contact with students is what keeps you in education, the office will feel like a loss no matter what it pays. If you're more interested in what a whole building could be doing, the role gives you room the classroom can't.
- The trade is reach for closeness - you gain influence over a whole building and lose the daily classroom moments that pulled most teachers into education.
- The raise is smaller than it looks - the median for K-12 education administrators was $105,870 as of May 2025, but the contract year runs longer than a teacher's.
- Evaluations are the hardest part - delivering an honest, unwelcome evaluation to a former colleague is routine work in this job.
- Your state sets the requirements - the degree, the exam, and the required years of classroom experience come from your state's educator-licensing agency, not a national standard.
2025 US Bureau of Labor Statistics salary figures for Education Administrators, Kindergarten through Secondary reflect national data, not school-specific information. Conditions in your area may vary. Data accessed August 2026.
Almost every principal posting starts with a master's in educational leadership, and for most teachers that's the piece still missing. The programs listed on this page include online and part-time formats built for people teaching full time, so the coursework doesn't have to wait until you leave the classroom.
- The Pros and Cons of Being a Principal: An Honest Look - July 29, 2021
- Special Needs Prom: How One Student Led His School’s Grand March - April 20, 2021
- Behavior Management Training for Teachers: What to Ask For - October 9, 2020
