Pay in Private School

[starchildmum]

Hi

I would like to know how much PPA time is the minimum for a part time teacher?

I have had a job interview this week and the school would like to pay me 0.6 % spread over 4 days. Apparently pay represents 66% of a full time teacher's timetable
( without PPA time).

I am furious as I believe I should also be paid for a bit of PPA time.
Am I supposed to do all extra duties i.e preparation and marking in my own time?

What is your view on this?

Ask them for .7 and see how that goes down.

Or recalculate when you account for the fact that you can just swan up for your first lesson, and not do early duty, registration or assembly. That's if you are nitpicking.

Don't underestimate how lightly you are getting off by not having a form. Pastoral care in private schools is huge and highly time consuming.

I work similar days 2 full days, one day where I have to be in all day but have some frees (unpaid) throughout the day and then one full afternoon. I think as others have said they are being fair (and I would quite like that package!).

See I don't get it applepinkierainbow:

If a full time teacher works 32 lessons out of 42

You should work 16

What a full time teacher does is none of her business.

Yes but I don't have to go to assemblies or do prep or evening duty or after school club which is an extra 3+ hours a week. Plus as BizzyFizzy says a form is a lot of work (I used to be full time and I would have about 2 hours a week of time taken up by them (or their parents!!)). As I said it still doesn't seem right but I knew what I was getting myself into when I accepted a part time contract.

When I was in a traditional prep school (working 8 - 6, plus Saturday mornings), one of my full time colleagues asked about going to a teaching only contract (i.e. no prep or ridiculous duties), and her pay would have been cut to 60%. So 40% of the pay was for prep, chapel, duties and enrichment. She soldiered on with the exhausting regime. I left.

What do other private school teachers think? Do you think pay is fair for you??

Pay is individual to any private schools. A lot will pay the same as state schools on the main scale (up to M6) or will pay a % more or less.

Where pay scales deviate is for middle and senior managers. The state sector is far more into paying for responsibility and demarcation. Middle managers in the private sector are often content with a £500 - £1000 extra. There is really no concept of TLR/points.

The caveat is that all private schools are different, so some very well endowed schools may well have a decent salary progression.

It seems to be they are calculating your pay on teaching load and not physical number of days in school. I know people who have had a part-time timetable spread over 5 working days (which worked well for them because it enabled school drop-offs/pick-ups for their own children)
Teachers' pay surely covers all the 'extras' that are done in 'free time' such as being a Form tutor, attending staff meetings, attending/leading CPD, lunchtime tutoring of students needing support, leading extra-curricular activities, etc... which extend well beyond set PPA times.

All in all, if you don't feel the pay is reasonable, you're under no obligation to take it. What do the school say about your pay calculations?

oh, and to answer your question starchild, I think your offer is rather good!

starchild I don't understand your issue. Why not use your frees on your day with the five periods to do get ahead with marking and planning. I still have to come across a teacher who manages to do all their work in their PPA time, if they are lucky to get it. We all work evening and weekends when it gets busy. It's part of the job, part or full time.

Please don't accept the job. You

Sorry, stupid phone.

Please don't accept this job if you are going to be the moaner in the staff room who never stops.

Impossible to state whether what they are paying is fair as it is such a personal thing. Will you get discount on fees? Do the days and times fit with your own dc drop offs? Do the longer holidays help with childcare?

Honestly, no one can say if it is fair if they don't know how it fits into your lifestyle.

I forget if you have mentioned the subject. English - huge amounts of marking, ICT - not so much.

You may wish to check if your pay is term time or including holidays.

Finally, don't forget, its a private school. They could decide to pay you £5 an hour or £100 per hour. Its entirely up to them. If you don't like the whole package don't take the job!

You are failing to see the difference between the length of day in state and independent..

Boarding schools pay their staff to teach, but also to carry out a wide range of other duties which take up considerable time. So a full time teacher won't just teach and prepare lessons but also spend lots of time as a tutor, , running teams and doing lots of other things, often working 6 days a week (or more) and being available on and off until far beyond the end of lesson times.Because of this, it is very difficult to be precise about exactly how many lessons spent teaching are full time, because it will be adjusted according to other responsibilities people have. Anyone who doesn't undertake house duties or work at the weekend or do extra curricular is doing less than those who do, so will be paid less.

There is no point feeling furious about this. If you don't understand how it is all calculated, email them and politely ask - without being stroppy. Simply ask how they calculate the %pay for part timers and how they calculate the no of teaching periods and non contact time. And they will then explain it to you.

You may well find that they then ask you to do other stuff too such as run matches on a Saturday as well on a pro rata basis - and if you aren't doing those, then you are contributing less and being paid less too.

In independent schools , there is a need for a lot of flexibility and goodwill, rather than rigidity. In term time, people sacrifice a lot and often work very long days, with blocks of non-contact time at odd parts in the day. Some people like this because the pace of the day can be calmer, but it is also longer.

Not having a Form, not running after school activities and not running Saturday fixtures will save you more time than the few free periods you seem keen to have paid.

I would ask. And I would also consider carefully if this set-up is for you. You don't sound at all flexible and also extremely grumpy, without even really seeking to clarify the arrangement. If you want ridgid and working to rule, this won't be for you.

Definitely not a place for 'work to rule' mentality. Maybe worth checking about expectations for parent-teacher meetings (often stretching into the evenings), end of term carol services (another late night), weekends ...

Private schools will get away with paying as little as possible. I never got ppa doing mornings and less than pro rata pay BUT the pay off was small classes, fitted in with my children and it was easy compared to state and a lot less rigid.

For the record, part timer in a state school - contract is calculated as a percentage of teaching time only, with 10% as PPA. My timetable is a patchwork so there are 'free' periods where I'm in school but unpaid.
Tutor time, open evenings, meetings, parents evenings and duties are directed time so I have to do a pro-rata share (I do some tutor times, pro-rata duties, but all necessary parents evenings, this is worked out with line manager).

Red Helen, PPA is not a private school thing so it's unlikely to appear on your timetable. Any I have worked in have a standard teaching allocation of 80% of the total number of lesson, but it's not a promise as some people may be a lesson or two over, and some under. This usually evens out with distribution of cover and duties.

As for salaries, the vast majority of independent school pay the same main scale as state school. Some small, struggling school will pay less, but many pay a bit more. A lot provide totally free food (breakfast, lunch, snacks), and some will give you some kind of staff uniform.

The place where private school teachers are less well paid is for middle and senior management duties. They might get a token £500 - £1000, for example, as well as a reduced timetable.

I'm just going in the one I worked in. The full time staff had ppa (but often had to cover) I also had more playground duties too. But as I said it suited at the time and I quite liked playing with the children at break!

The state school concept of PPA doesn't work in independent schools, as it's unusual to have cover supervisors or supply teachers. Cover is usually in-house, with first choice a member of the same department. 20% "free lessons" means that some of them will be taken for cover. Unless in a very big school, it's unusual to protect any given slot. In a happy school, there won't be a lot of staff absence for stress, so there should be a huge amount of cover and still plenty of time to prepare and mark.

Unless you are a sessional teacher, you are paid for free time as your overall salary package.

Going by a typical school with one free lesson for every four taught, then a teacher should be paid for 1.25x number of lessons. A good timetabler will make sure that all of these taught and free lessons are in contiguous blocks, so that there is no "trapped" time (free lessons over and above the allocation).

Depends when you finish on the half day?

And hang onto that statement by Ffion 1 free for every 4 taught as typical private sector, i am standard state comp and get considerably less than 1 free every 6 lessons, not inc tutor time morning meetings etc as lessons.

If there are 35 lessons in a week, and you are teaching 18, that's only 51(ish)%? So if they are paying you 60%, they are paying you some non-contact time surely?

Mathematician here and don't get what the problem is..

Either you look at what you are teaching+non contact out of full timetable so 18+noncontact /35

Or look at your teaching out of a full time teachers. Using 28 if that's what a full time teacher teaches, your just comparing their teaching (not any frees) with your teaching. That's 64%, so that's fair.

Rachie, presumably the children get 35 lessons a week and the teachers on ft contracts don't actually teach that many.

I wouldn't find the offer fair. It's supposedly 0.6 but if you wanted to do the remaining 0.4 across the road, you wouldn't be able to, would you? I'd expect 0.7 if I'm in the school 3.5 days a week. If you have no form, you could treat that as some time towards prep or marking. How many weeks a year would you work? It's usually fewer than state schools so it might be full on whilst you're working but then you're off for longer so that's a lot of hours you wouldn't work.

JoJo, no I think they OP said a full-time teacher teaches 28 from 35.

So they teach 80% of a timetable.

If OP is paid for 60%, that would be 21 out of the 35. OP said she teaching 18. Therefore she is getting paid for 3 extra lessons as non contact.