You train the people who'll teach music in schools, blending musicianship with the craft of teaching it, preparing future educators for the classroom. Teaching teachers how to teach music.
A typical day mixes teaching, supervising student teachers, research, and service, set to the academic calendar. You'll move between classroom, rehearsal spaces, and your own scholarship. You're teaching both music and how to teach it, so the craft is in modeling good pedagogy while delivering content — much of the work is preparing students for the real, messy classrooms they'll soon run.
The role balances teaching and scholarship by institution. Music education programs can face enrollment and funding pressure, balancing teaching, research, and service is constant, and you're preparing students for a field where school music itself is sometimes under threat. Positions can be competitive or contingent, and student readiness varies, as in any teaching field.
The work rewards people who are musical, generous, and energized by developing teachers — who care about music's place in education. If you want a performance career or research prestige above all, this may not satisfy. But for those moved by shaping the teachers who'll keep music alive in schools, the influence ripples through many classrooms.
Don't do Truest if you aren't ready
to invest in yourself and your career.
Where this role sits in the broader career landscape — and where it can take you.
Your job belongs to your employer.
Your career belongs to you.
Roles like this one sit within a broader occupational category. The numbers below reflect that full landscape — helpful for context, but your specific experience will depend on level, specialty, and where you work.
You train the people who'll teach music in schools, blending musicianship with the craft of teaching it, preparing future educators for the classroom. Teaching teachers how to teach music.
Median pay for a Music Education Professor is about $72K nationally, with the field ranging roughly from $39K to $126K depending on experience, employer, and metro (BLS).
Core skills for this role include Speaking, Reading Comprehension, Instructing, Active Listening, and Learning Strategies.
Most people in this role hold a professional degree.
Employment in this field is projected to grow about 2.1% through 2034, with roughly 59,090 people working in it today (BLS).
Closely related roles include Education Director, Continuing Education Instructor, and Educational Instructor.
Don't do Truest if you aren't ready
to invest in yourself and your career.