Conversation with a Shop Teacher

I was talking to a welding teacher earlier tonight. He teaches high schoolers all day, then adult students like me at night.
I've talked to a lot of shop teachers. This one said something especially frank.
"It's hard to get anyone to take me seriously around here. Even the administration."
He explained that this was why he'd gotten a Master's, and he said it in a way that made me empathize.
His tone belied a contentious relationship with his colleagues, one that found him fighting for resources, for funds, for respect for being a Teacher, dammit, not the ringmaster of some sooty circus.