TEACHING ASSISTANTS – UPDATE ON CONTRACTS – SEPTEMBER 2007

 

Development Days

It is a requirement for all Teaching Assistants to attend development days on a pro-rata basis depending on their contracted hours.  If staff work only part of the working week say Thursday/Friday it may be difficult or impossible for them to come in on a development day set on say a Monday.  Wirral Unison would expect schools to demonstrate reasonableness in the allocation of development days and their staff’s attendance.

 

Extra Hours

The agreement provides for up to 15 days extra work per year, for the purposes of training, preparation and assessment.  Up to 7 days of the 15 can be used during the school holidays on the following days:

 

            2 days after school finishes in July

            2 days before school restarts in September and

            1 day in each of the three half-terms

 

There is no agreement to substitute alternative days for these dates.  The remaining eight days should be converted into hours and used during term-time but for activities outside normal core hours e.g. staff meetings, parents evenings etc.

 

Qualifications

Wirral Unison supports the qualification matrix associated with the professionisation of Teaching Assistants.  Teaching Assistants attending courses in line with those qualifications should be allowed to count those hours against their extra hours totals for the year, when the course is outside normal core school time.  Wirral Unison and Wirral Council are signatories to the national agreement which says that the relevant qualification and or experience can be taken into account when setting the grade of Teaching Assistants.  Wirral Unison believes that people should be paid for their duties and responsibilities not purely on the qualification they hold.

 

School Clubs

The question of TA’s running out of school clubs has come up several times.  The rule should be if it is an activity that would normally attract an extra payment for running then it would not be suitable for the extra hours.  But if it is an initiative that the TA wants to be involved with and has the blessing of the school then it is ok.  TA’s need to work the extra hours in consultation with the school but cannot be forced to work during school holidays other than those already mentioned.

 

GEOFF BRADFILED

JUNE 2007