How A Former Teacher Made 24 Years' Worth Of Her Salary In Just 6 Months
"The district I was working for is also one of the lowest paying districts in the state. I feel like times are tough."
ESB Professional / Shutterstock A former Missouri high school teacher was reprimanded by administrators after her side hustle to earn more money was revealed.
Twenty-eight-year-old Brianna Coppage, who taught freshman and sophomore English at St. Clair High School in Franklin County, about 55 miles southwest of St. Louis, decided to search for a better way to make money during the summer of 2023 and was met with backlash from her superiors at the high school.
Coppage created an OnlyFans account to supplement her low teaching salary.
While speaking with Fox News, Coppage revealed that she was making a staggering amount of money compared to what she was being paid while teaching. The 28-year-old had only been a public school educator for five years, spending her last two at St. Clair High School.
She noted that her annual teaching salary was $42,000 before she eventually decided to get into OnlyFans to not only supplement her income but to also provide a cushion to pay back her student loans. The OnlyFans account wasn't just Coppage, as she and her husband ran the account together and posted content between the two of them.
"Missouri is one of the lowest states in the nation for teacher pay," Coppage told KMOV. "The district I was working for is also one of the lowest paying districts in the state. I feel like times are tough. I have student loans. I have multiple degrees in education, and it would be helpful for extra money."
Due to the nature of her job, she made sure that all of the explicit photos posted on her OnlyFans account had her face covered in the hopes of avoiding backlash or even losing her job altogether.
"A lot of people asking why didn’t you just get a part-time job somewhere," Coppage said. "That seems like that would’ve worked better but teachers also take all of their work home. We don’t get to stop working when we leave the school day. We don’t get to grade all 130 students’ papers during the day."
"It’s just not possible when you’re teaching, so we take that work home with us on the evenings and on the weekends. Getting a second job is really not possible.” Coppage’s OnlyFans account was able to rake in between $8,000 and $10,000 per month.
Despite trying her best to avoid the school finding out about her account, she ended up resigning after the link was shared.
Coppage’s OnlyFans account was originally discovered by the St. Clair School District after a link to the page was posted in a St. Clair Facebook group, and according to KMOV, the individual who exposed the link was not affiliated with the school.
"I’m not advertising it to students, but adults in the community continue to do so," Coppage said. "I just don’t think that’s okay. Students were never meant to see this. I know people are saying you taught high school they were bound to find it at some point. Maybe. I was faceless. I did not use my real name."
Due to the attention that her OnlyFans account was gaining, she knew that her position at the school was no longer safe and decided to resign. Coppage insisted that she had never filmed any content on school grounds, however, with tens of thousands of followers, the former teacher was able to make more in a year doing OnlyFans than she did as an educator.
In total, Coppage told revealed that she's made nearly $1 million on the platform.
"I’m very aware that I am probably never going to teach again, but that was kind of the risk I knew I was taking. I am sad about that. I do miss my students," Coppage said. Despite the outcome, she maintains that the decision to start an OnlyFans page in the first place isn't something she regrets at all.
"I do not regret joining OnlyFans. I know it can be taboo, or some people may believe that it is shameful, but I don’t think [it] has to be shameful," she added. "I do just wish things just happened in a different way."
Photo: Karolina Grabowska from Pexels / Canva Pro
It's no secret that teachers in this country are severely underpaid. A survey of public school teachers by the RAND Corporation found that unless attention is paid to improving the overall working conditions for teachers, many will continue to leave the profession altogether.
On average, teachers estimate working 53 hours a week. That's seven more hours than the average working adult, and only 24% of teachers are satisfied with their total weekly hours worked, compared with 55% of working adults. A quarter of teachers’ time is uncompensated, and 66% say their base salary is inadequate, compared with 39% of working adults.
While Coppage's decision to resign was her personal choice after her OnlyFans account was blasted across the high school, there's something to say about the staggering amount of public school educators who feel the need to take up side hustles and second jobs just to make ends meet.
It calls into question how many more teachers need to resign because they've found a more lucrative career for something to be done about the unpaid hours that many of them pour into their professions, only to get close to nothing in return.
Nia Tipton is a Chicago-based entertainment, news, and lifestyle writer whose work delves into modern-day issues and experiences.