I have become much more content with my current job over the past decade, and thus the main impetus to stretch myself educationally has been largely removed. True, there have always been some minor financial incentives to going farther (increasing my pay through a "lane change" at either Lincoln or Baker), but that wasn't enough to overcome the time and effort constraints on my life. All of that might be changing due to financial concerns at my district (and most school districts in the U.S.). Under the guise of solving governmental budgets, politicians around the nation have been gutting public schools. The situation is desperate enough that my own position is even more tenuous than those years when I received actual pink slips from the district.
The real problem is that, if I lose my job, I can't hire in anywhere else at anything near what I'm making now (which is the closest that I've been to being justly compensated). I am not sure how well my family could weather such a drastic reduction to our income. With that in mind, I am considering taking on more debt to increase my educational level and hopefully open more job opportunities should the need arise.
To be clear, I would prefer to stay in the high school classroom. I love what I do. Being denied that, I would prefer to either 1. continue to work at the high school (or even middle school) level as a building administrator, or 2. continue to work in a classroom at the collegiate level.
So, my conundrum is about what degree I should pursue. Degrees that focus on becoming an administrator are usually at the Master's level (or Educational Specialist). They provide the best opportunity for employment and financial compensation and only take about three years to complete, but aren't doctorate level and don't (on their own) lead to teaching at the collegiate level. Ph.D.s in Education are programs that can run to nine years, tend not to structure well around people with current K-12 teaching jobs and, while they focus on more of the "big question" issues in education, tend to limit job options to collegiate teaching only. Ed.D.s are faster than the Ph.D.s but have similar limiting issues to job possibilities. In this case, the leadership degrees are more focused on central office (superintendent, curriculum director, etc) or higher education (better pay, but I would probably need building-level experience to really be a good candidate to get a job).
Add to this the questions of online degrees (or "degree-mills") as opposed to on ground degrees, as well as various schools' reputations (all claim to be the best choice), and I am thoroughly confused. Maybe sifting through these many choices is one of the first tests to see if a person is ready for this higher level of education. Still, any thoughts or suggestions on this matter would be appreciated.