Struggling TA on wages

[harrypotter1993]

I have been a TA since January last year, to say the pay is abysmal is an understatement. I am a single guy, but I am finding that I'm skint every month, at least a week before we're due to be paid. I have tried finding a second job/better paid and there is literally nothing. I literally don't know what to do. I live at home because I can't afford to move out so I am not entitled to any benefits. Can anyone help?

What exactly do you want help with? You need to figure out how much money would make you happy and work out if your profession can provide that and work towards it accordingly. Alternatively, you need a career change.

Does your school have an after school club? My sons TA also works in the out of schools a few evenings a week. Holiday clubs and nurseries are a good way to earn some money in the school holidays as supply staff. You could also maybe pick up some cleaning work in your school in the evening?

It's just about the worst paid job you could do, when you take into account that you are probably not paid for the holidays and are not working 35/40 hours pw.
Could you do something else on the side, a bit of tutoring or childcare? Or in an afterschool club? It's not really something that young people do for any length of time, more a way of finding out if they want to teach.

Can you work towards training as a teacher long term if you like school work? Otherwise you do basically need to change jobs as you will never earn enough as a TA because the hours are relatively short and the long school holidays affect pay too

You could move across to somewhere like my setting. I work in an independent special school and we have residential homes attached to our school in the local area. We have TA's that choose to do extra shifts in the homes around school hours. Some choose to do an evening or weekend shift and have the holidays off, others say they don't need all the school hols off so pick up hours in the hols.

The system expects you to have children and so be able to claim universal credit. Sadly in a low pay society those without children or those whose children have left home get the worst possible deal. Benefits support low wages (and in retail cheaper prices)

Well being a TA isn't working for you so basically you're asking us to give you careers advice based on virtually no information.

Info about which part of the country you live in, what qualifications you have and what sort of work you'd really like to do would be a help. What sort of thing he have you been applying for? How far in the application process do you normally get? Have you had any feedback about why you didn't get jobs you applied for? How much effort are you putting into job hunting? How old are you? Have you considered apprenticeships (one of my dcs is doing an apprenticeship at the moment and is paid a damn sight more than a TA while he is training). What are your strengths and weaknesses?

I am qualified to Masters level. I would like to go back into teaching and finish my training eventually, but want to know what else I can go into in Education. I'm from Kent and I'm 30.

Bite the bullet and do your PGCE. My friend did and worked around it. Hospitality, bar work in the evening means you can study. You're going to be skint for another year.

Yes I agree the pay is shocking, the job is set up for Mums basically who want extra money working term time hours only.

I work in a school with a lot of TAs and they complain endlessly about the pay, in the one had I do agree that it is poorly paid but on the other, they only work 25 hours a week tell-time only. One of the young men I work with is always going on about it and I often think “why don’t you either get a second job or another one with more hours?” At his age I was working 40 hours, most people work full time when they have no children.

I also encourage a lot of TAs to look at going to college and progressing that way. There’s no way to progress like there may be in other similar roles such as in nurseries which I find sad. So you’re paid the same after a year as you would after 15.

If you want to stay in education surely you just need to crack on and do a PGCE?

If you are ready to take the leap into teaching look into paid ITT (initial teacher training routes) such as SCITT, and salaried Schools direct. You will need school experience for these. If you speak to head they may know schools that support this or they may support you themselves. A PGCE costs £9k so it is worth looking into the other options.
I'd also suggest you work on budgeting, If you are living at home and have no money left for the last week spend some time researching budgeting, there's loads on Instagram and someone that helped me was Dave Ramsay. You need to work out how much you get and how to stretch that over the month, (I was paid £7k a year as a TA when I started, I know its not easy!!)
But learning how to budget what you do get will help throughout your whole life!
Hope you find what suits you!

The problem is not only is the hourly rate crap, you're paid pro rata and because of the school day it's not a full working week so you're effectively part time as well. The only people who can stay in the role in my school are married with 2 wages coming in. I can't imagine many people can manage as a single person.

I was a TA before becoming a teacher and I also worked in a restaurant 4 nights a week. Surely you can find some kind of second job if you need to boost your salary?

Op, I’m an ex-teacher. I now work full-time on Cambly kids online. Not going to lie, the pay is abysmal, ($12 ph)but as a stopgap, you could look into it to supplement your income. It’s something you could do in the evenings. You’ll get the Turkish and Brazilian kids at this time who are great fun. If you work extra at weekends in the day, you’ll get children from the Far East. You can tutor adults too, but the pay is less. The kids’ courses are all planned for you and you set your own schedule. You really just need a headset and laptop, and a few fun props. https://www.cambly.com/en/tutors?lang=en

A lot of TA's at my school work as PA's at weekends, evenings and in holidays for children with additional needs, my daughter also does this in her Uni holidays (she worked as a TA for her gap year before going to train in SEN teaching) and it is great fun and pays pretty well. She also works at a SEN playscheme during the holidays which she absolutely loves and this does pay well too. It's also great experience and good for your CV.
Worth looking into?

The TAs I know are mums and it’s a second salary as the Dh is a decent wage earner as it’s a job that fits around primary age kids. Pretty much all of them left for something better paid once their kids moved on.

I would sign up for Teach First and get paid as you get your teaching qualification.

The pay is indeed awful. I'm constantly appalled that National Minimum Wage was brought it so that one adult could afford to support a family. Which they could back then. Now one adult on National Minimum Wage can't even support themselves. Appalling.

Why would you do this very part time job with shit pay unless you had to juggle something at home?

You chose a job that is made for people who need to work term tine and school hours, of course its going to be crap wages.

You will get better pay working for a nursery full-time. If you have a TA qualification then you can probably walk straight into a nursery job.

I would like to go back into teaching and finish my training

well crack on and do that then!

Why can't you apply for teacher training now?

I'm afraid that the answer is to leave or qualify as a teacher.

I can understand someon with no qualifications and trying to run a home on a TA salary saying it isn't enough.

But you have a masters degree. You can do your PGCE and with ambition and work ethic you could be a head teacher a few years later. What's stopping you?

What's your degree? You could do a Level 6 Teaching Apprenticeship to become a qualified teacher without going back to Uni. If your school would support, you could do it in your current role.

I would like to go back into teaching and finish my training eventually, but want to know what else I can go into in Education.

Once you have your teaching qualification there are many different jobs you could do, in policy work, safeguarding etc but you need to be a qualified teacher first of all. What’s stopping you completing your training?