Teaching assistants: how do you survive?

[Runaround50]

Calling all teaching assistants up and down the country.
How do you manage financially? Do you claim UC to make ends meet? Rely on partner/ husband to pay mortgage/ rent/ bills?

I've been a TA for 3 years and just cannot survive on the money.

Needless to say, I'm looking for a higher paid role in earnest.

Just gives my location and not kern on that.
Just believe me please. I swear I am not fibbing.

I asked oh to send me his payslip he said no lol.

That's understandable.

To add to that, my friend left part time teaching due to stress and became a full time TA. She took home about the same monthly wage as a full time TA as she did as a 0.4 teacher.

I started this thread in 2018

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/amiibeingunreasonable/3393371-TA-salary?page=1

I've had a read, sounds like we're not the only ones who can't believe it either!

My dh is 23k (actual)

Most TA’s I know have a high wage partner at home and just do the job for a bit of fun money or something to do. No one makes a career out of it.

Maybe I have a short fuse as I have been saying it for years

I've found the job, it does look a lot more in depth in terms of knowledge and responsibility. And 37 hours per week. And 46 weeks per year. I'd say the salary advertised suitably reflects all of that.

I knew I wasn't the only one.

Are you in the South?

No I do understand it must be frustrating. It's just unbelievable! I need to move to your town.

www.thinkteaching.co.uk/careers-advice/teaching-assistant/salary/

Seems as if it depends on your contract. So, some schools / areas might have contracts which include paid leave over the school holidays, so you get an actual salary which is the same as the ones elsewhere before they are pro rated. They seem to be less common though and £12k is the national average according to my googling

It goes further up here too. I nearly bought a little house on that wage just a 2 bed but still there was no chance of that when I lived In Berkshire.

It's more than a HlTA. It's the only job at the minute but they often come up in the range of 20 to 27k for standard TAs.

@Violashift I'm a southerner who moved from the Home Counties to the north west. The cost of our three bed home in a lovely village would have got us a one bed bedsit where I'm from.

North East. Which is why we can afford to live on his and my wage combined (I was on similar until very recently).

As a TA in Scotland, I'm shocked to read all these salarys! We've just fought for a parish- I've been earning just over £10ph for the last few years. I have a degree, have recently completed my 31st specicialise training course, can work with all manner of needs, take huge responsibility for hundreds of children and yet I'd get paid more in a supermarket. The role is hugely undervalued in Scotland when the reality is that we are trained, experienced professionals. No wonder we are all leaving in our droves.

Not a parish, a payrise. Why can't we edit posts?

Most of us share your experience of low salaries. I do and I live in an expensive part of the country in the South. TAs are leaving to get jobs as receptionists or similar, and we struggle hugely these days to replace them, despite the school hours. There are many better paid jobs with less responsibility & more money.
Even HLTAs don't earn much more money in my school, despite being expected to supervise small classes and other staff.
And I had not heard of a TA getting paid for the holidays until reading this thread.

I’m a HLTA on the top band and I earn about £23k a year. It would be £30k if I could work 37 hours with no school holidays which would be a decent amount for what I do. The problem is that there’s no option for working more hours, no chance of over time and I no longer need the school holidays as DS is a teenager. There’s no option for me to further my career either, I’ve already peaked. Therefore, I am leaving to join the civil service as soon as my vetting is approved. At first I will still earn £23k+ but there’s much more scope for development and increasing my earnings. DH is a highish earner but I’ve still had to take on a holiday job to have enough to live on.

The ones I know are married to bankers / corporate lawyers / consultants.

My DD is a teaching assistant in London. She lives at home rent free. She would like to find a better paying job but hasn’t been successful so far. She doesn’t want to be a teacher. She has a first class degree from an RG university. It’s tough.

TA wage is appalling. In my old school the TAs would cover the teacher weekly for PPA.
No extra money and head never even checked in on us but that wasn’t a good schooL and am well rid.
TA is a lovely role in the right school with the right colleagues. Children are always what make the job so special and it’s a lovely role but disgustingly poorly paid.

I’m a 1-1 Sen TA in a mainstream school. I work 21.5hrs a week and take home about £750pm. The job suits me for now because my children are still young and it means we don’t have to worry about childcare but I am only afforded the luxury of doing this because like many on here, DH is a high earner.

For what TA’s do now the pay is appalling. Once my youngest is old enough to be home alone I’ll be looking for a new job.

I am paid for 28 hours pw, term time + the statutory holiday pay which means I get paid for a total of 44 weeks per annum, paid over 22 months. My actual gross pay is just over £13000pa. For that I support children in class, plan and run intervention groups as well as having responsibility for all children with a particular learning need within our school. I also cover classes for the first day of teacher absence. I have other responsibilities within school which take a lot of my time. We used to get an hour a week planning allocated on our timetables, but not now. Planning has to be done after work or at home. When children are in school, we have to be with them. We have lost several TAs recently, as they could not afford to do the job any longer and have all moved on to full time, better paid employment. I can only afford it because DH is retired and our DC's no longer live at home. I don't undertow younger people can manage financially. Staff who leave our school do not get replaced, due to the issues with school budgets that all schools face. I love my job, but am honestly counting down the last few years until I retire.
I am pleased that in some areas, TAs seem to be being paid a reasonable rate for the job we actually do. Trouble is, it is not consistent around the county and there is still a widespread belief that TA equals 'classroom helper' who just listens to a few readers and puts up displays.