School support staff want 'fair' deal

Ashburton College teacher aide Cezarne Rodgers hands over the open letter to Rangitata electorate...
Ashburton College teacher aide Cezarne Rodgers hands over the open letter to Rangitata electorate secretary Alison Driscoll.
Last week school support staff across the country held a week of action to express frustrations over the stalling of collective agreement and pay equity negotiations.

Dozens of Ashburton College staff and support staff signed an open to local MP Andrew Falloon asking him for help in putting pressure on the government to give more job security and a better wage to school support staff.

Mr Falloon was out of the district and at a sitting of Parliament, but the letter was delivered to his Ashburton office by Ashburton College teacher aide Cezarne Rodgers and accepted by electorate secretary Alison Driscoll.

Ms Rodgers said some 95 per cent of school support staff were paid less than the living wage of $21.15, while 12 per cent were on the minimum wage of $17.70.

"The hours we work can be as little as 15 hours per week up to 25 hours and a number of support staff are on term to term, or year to year contracts, which means a lot of uncertainty and often means some have to hold down more than one job.''

Support staff included teacher aides, administration staff, librarians, Maori language assistants and technicians, she said.

Supporting the Fair's Fair campaign and dressing in black and white are Andrena Skinner, Rachael...
Supporting the Fair's Fair campaign and dressing in black and white are Andrena Skinner, Rachael Love, Ally Greer, Cassie Mitchell, Jan Begg, Roz Cuter, Jodi Duffel and Maureen Meanwell.
Ms Rodgers, who has been a teacher aide for 15 years, said support staff were not centrally funded by government, unlike teachers.

"Our salaries come out of school operational budgets, so we compete against maintenance costs, power and so on.

"Any small wage increases we receive come from the same school pot which does not get any bigger.''

Ms Rodgers said the feeling from support staff was that ``enough was enough'' and that it was time for the government to set up and administer a central fund to pay support staff.

The same sentiment is echoed by Netherby School teacher aide Ally Greer.

Netherby School staff and pupils dressed in black and white and wrote catchy slogans on Monday to support the Fair's Fair campaign.

Mrs Greer said school support staff did their jobs "for the love of it and not for the money'', but, at the same time, they should be paid "what they deserved''.

"Like everyone else, we still need to pay our bills and we need certainty over the hours we work.''

After four years in her role, she was taking a different path, but was staying in the business of education because she was passionate about it.

Union NZEI Te Riu Roa has been negotiating collective agreements with the Ministry of Education since July 30 and pay equity processes for teacher aides have been ongoing for the past three years.

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