...to think teachers DO get paid over the holidays?

[MasterBeth]

It doesn't make sense to me.

Some people say teachers don't get paid over the holidays. They are paid, they say, for 40 weeks, but their money is aggregated over 52 weeks and paid monthly.

What does that even mean? How is it (practically) any different to being paid (less per week) for 52 weeks?

For it to be pro rata their contracts would have to state 37 hours per week 52 weeks per year. They don't, they are contracted for hours per year.

Teachers get paid their salary for 39 teaching weeks per year, 195 teaching days, they then get the standard holiday allowance of 28 days which is included within their salary the same as any other job. The rest of the holidays is not covered by their salary, and is unpaid. Teachers anual salary is paid in 12 equal amounts across each of the months of the year to prevent having some months with no pay which has been the case historically it is also easier for payroll and tax processing.

Exactly. I have a lot of respect for teachers and I do genuinely think they're underpaid. I would never go back to it but saying someone with the same responsibilities would earn significantly more is bs. It makes teachers look like twats. Which they're not. For the most part anyway.

I mean, they're saying they're only contracted for 39 weeks a year so not exactly. Also you have to factor in the fact everyone gets 4-6 weeks paid holiday in the UK so it wouldn't be quite that much.

Do you think teaching is the only profession to work more than bare minimum contracted hours?
Many salaried positions don't even have daily working hours listed in their contract anymore as it is expected the employee will stay until the work is finished.

So, if the pay year runs Sep 1 to Aug 31, and then a teacher leaves - say- at the May half term, then that teacher effectively doesn't get a fair share of the paid holiday?

Is that how it works?

What happens the other way round? Suppose someone takes up a new position after Easter. Do they still get paid the full rate over the summer?

Blimey the teacher bashing has started already and most schools aren't even back yet in England. And no, I'm not a teacher, nor could I be one.

If you are convinced it makes no material difference then what does it matter?

No, I don't, they are many, many professions that do. However they are not told that they are lazy and lucky to have the holidays like teachers are.

I'm not a teacher btw

You’re making a false equivalence.

The comparison here would be - do people continually say to those people working until the job is done ‘oh but you only work 9-5 and you get all those weekends off’

Well yes, they're salaried workers.

Who is suggesting they don't get paid for the holidays?

Yes they get paid all year round. Not the same as TA's who get a pro rated wage.

Yes OP you are being unreasonable… yes teachers do get paid over the holidays. However this pay is based on working 39 weeks a year (with standard holiday pay - this doesn’t increase with service). Totalling 44.6 weeks per year paid. This pay is spread out evenly over a 12 month period. Also bear in mind we don’t get a choice when we take our holidays and limited to the most expensive times of the year.

I am a teacher and have spent 6 full days in school setting up my classroom this Summer. An unreasonable amount writing an entire subject curriculum (probably 2 plus days). Then long term/medium planning for this term, teaching 3 year groups and oversee nursery. Probably about 3-4 days (maybe more). And that’s just the Summer holidays!

Question is OP would you work 12 days unpaid? That’s not including additional work I do in the evenings, parents evenings, performance, residential trips, other half term break tasks. Remember I am getting paid 39 weeks to work and 5.6 weeks as holiday - like you I should not be required to work during this holiday.

I think it just means they get longer holidays than is typical (with the provisio that of course teachers do carry out some work over the "holidays").

When a teacher stops work or changes jobs then (as far as I know?) it makes absolutely no difference in terms of their pay at what point in the year they stop. They get paid up until the time they stop work and no more. They don't get paid extra if they stop being employed shortly before the holidays, which they would presumably need to if they had already completed all their paid work for the year and were having the associated pay spread out over the whole year.

Or if instead of being paid at the end of the month, your salary was split up and paid in the form of daily pay transfers to your bank account.

You could work Monday to Friday but get a wages every day including Saturday and Sunday. Same amount of money received overall but people could say ha, you get paid for weekends.

As in common with other salaried positions teachers are paid monthly - if a holiday falls in that month then that is the way it is , for all positions not just teachers.

When I lived in the states the teachers literally didn't get paid over the summer break. The salary was paid during teaching hours only. Most of them took on summer jobs because of that.

So a teacher on M1 gets £30k, and that is divided into 12 chunks and paid throughout the year.

However, it's based on an overall contract which specifies that the teacher works 195 days of the year (190 contact days with students, 5 inset days).

The published salary for teachers is what we get paid. For TAs and some other support staff, the published salary on the advert is often pro-rata'd to take into account holidays.

But if the government decided actually students should have 200 days of contact time, then teachers would expect their pay to go up proportionally.

Honestly many many professions are like this. It's the world of work these day. Not right at all but I know of nobody who only works their contracted hours.

I think it all boils down to people who say teachers get 13 weeks of paid holiday a year. Which isn't true.

As a TA I get paid for the 39 weeks I work plus 5 weeks holiday. The other 8 weeks I guess are just unpaid holiday. My salary is divided by 12 months but its not 12 months work of salary (understandably as I don't work for 12 months!)

So yes I'm paid OVER the holidays but no not paid FOR the holidays.

Does that even make sense? Do I need to get back to work 😂

I’d be interested to know the number of TAs that get paid for holidays. That certainly doesn’t happen in my LA. I’m paid for 39 + 5.6 weeks. Plus a small amount extra for length of service.

But I know this wasn’t really your point.

I do see your point actually but I’m not sure of the semantics.

I think there's massive confusion here with TAs or support staff and Teachers. There's so many different contracts in education esp now with the unqualified teachers in the mix as well.

It's safe to say no one is paid for more holidays than they're entitled to. It's the same statutory entitlement as everyone else in a contracted role in the UK, but it's is paid pro rata for the most part.

I don't know any teachers that don't work in the holidays. Almost all who work in secondary schools that I still keep in touch with, are answering emails!

Yes.

I agree with you too they get 12 pay cheques and pay days a year. It’s the support staff who only work term time who suffer and don’t get an august pay day :( which must be hard to manage cash flows.