I went to school in the Chicago area. I even had several math and science teachers during middle school that were making 90k+ and that was a rough school.

That's very weird from my point of view that you're making 40,000 as a Science teacher.

There was a gym teacher at my high school that had been working there for 20 years and also taught drivers ed that made 120,000+.

That's incredibly odd that you're making what you do, as well as your contract not granting you anything over 40,000 for furthering your education. I think I remember one of my teachers talking about how much pay increase they would earn when renegotiating their contracts based on getting a masters or PhD and it was around 6,000 for each additional increase in education.

Most of the English teachers at my school all made 30-40k a year.

I don't think there was a single STEM teacher that made under 80,000 that had been working there for more than 5 years.