Understanding school employment

Overview

This guide contains useful information about school employment. It looks at:

legislation and regulations
payroll
appointing staff
individual and team performance.

Legislation and regulations

A number of legal requirements and Ministry of Education regulations exist for employment. The relevant legislation is contained in these Acts:

Legislation

Education Act 1989 still underpins most education practice, including employment.

State Sector Act 1988 part 7, sections 73–77, Personnel provisions, has relevance.

Employment Relations Act 2000 has many relevant parts – for example, part 9, Personal grievances, sections 102–128.

Ministry of Education regulations

NAG 3 relates to board and management legal responsibilities for personnel and employment matters, industrial policies, and being a good employer.

Employment agreements: collective and individual

Employment agreements are used to confirm the conditions of staff employment. These pages provide links to all school collective and individual agreements:

Collective agreements

Individual employment agreements

Payroll

Check that your school is using all the staffing it is entitled to. This list will help you to overview payroll elements, and these regular tasks mean that your staff will get paid. The regular arrival of correct pay ensures they can meet their financial commitments. Even a few dollars missed off a payment or, even worse, having to wait a fortnight for pay can result in financial difficulties for people.

Confirm the staffing levels determined and paid for by the Ministry of Education.

Confirm who is paid directly by the Ministry of Education from Teachers Salaries (TS).

Confirm other staffing determined and paid for by the board of trustees.

Confirm who is paid from the Board Grant (BG).

Confirm that the full cost of wages and salaries to be paid for from the BG for the year match budget expectations.

Check the SUE (Staff Usage and Expenditure) reports to see that all your staff have been paid correctly. Their level of pay must fit the conditions of their employment agreement. This includes special allowances, responsibility payments, and any adjustments from a previous pay period.

Confirm that your school’s banking staffing processes follow the pattern you expect.

Ensure pay adjustments for the next pay period are made before the 'cut-off' time laid down by your pay authority.

How banking staffing links to leading learning

It is 26 April. You need additional teacher hours to deliver a 10-day Gifted and Talented Programme during August. Make a practice copy of your Banking Staffing spreadsheet and set this up so that in August, you can employ another full teacher for the equivalent of 10 days.

Appointing staff

As an educational leader, you will seek the best appointees for your school. Use processes that ensure new staff members are able and ready to help advance school development.

This list will help you plan the steps in advance that you need to work through for staff appointments.

Identify what sort of appointment, if any, is possible or should be made. Use curriculum needs, Ministry of Education regulations, confirmed staffing levels, and board of trustees budget limitations to help.

Know and use the school’s advertising and appointment procedures, and ensure your procedures meet the requirements of the Collective Employment Agreements. Use NZSTA guidelines to assist.

During the selection and appointment process, carefully check the background and performance of applicants. Start with registration, contact all referees, ask searching questions about capability, and think of and ask about what has not been stated on paper or in an interview. Be very methodical in building a picture of applicants on your short list.

Know and use the school induction processes to help the new staff member adapt to the changes involved in a new place of employment.

Details of appointment processes and a range of templates can be downloaded from the NZSTA website.

Use Chapter 2 of the Resourcing Handbook to understand and confirm the annual staffing cycles and whether you are in a position to offer a teaching position.

How staff changes link to leading learning

It is 29 June. A permanent teacher resigned yesterday, taking effect from the end of term 3. She is teaching a composite year 3–4 class if you are in a primary school, and a teacher of health and physical education if you are in a secondary school.

You are lobbied by some staff and your board chair to immediately advertise the position in the Gazette that closes at 5.00pm tomorrow.

What are you, as the educational leader, going to do about this by noon tomorrow?

Individual and team performance: teachers

Teacher registration and appraisal are parts of the New Zealand school scene. They are confirmed as law in the State Services Act 1995, the Education Act and its amendments, and the legal requirements of the Employment Relations Act 2000, and you must follow their requirements.

You must be aware of how collective or individual employment agreements regulate some aspects of appraisal and performance. Linked to the legislation are Ministry of Education regulations and requirements.

Over the past few years, you will have been aware of a growing focus on the development of teacher performance goals that involve being part of an effective staff team working collaboratively to meet higher performance goals.

Increased emphasis on whole-staff development has expanded the importance of finding out how teachers are performing, sharing teaching practice, and providing and responding to meaningful teacher development.

This list will help you to review how you approach individual and team performance at your school:

We have a robust staff appraisal system.

I can use this appraisal system to understand the qualities of our staff.

I know and am satisfied with staff development processes at our school.

I know from regular reviews how staff development is progressing and how to formulate teacher development goals and strategies for the future.

I know and understand the processes related to dealing with teacher competency issues.

I am prepared to apply those processes to deal with competency issues.

These sources of information focus on quality teachers, quality teaching, and staff development:

Satisfactory teacher dimensions – NZ Teachers Council

Criteria for registration – NZ Teachers Council

Performance management systems – Ministry of Education documents

A Matter of Performance (Leadership Dilemma)

Making Performance Management Perform

Enhancing Internal Capacity (PDF 148KB)

Consensus: Tap into a Powerful Decision-making Tool

A complaint about teacher performance

During the first month of being a principal, you have fielded three expressions of concern about Mr M, a permanent teacher, failing to provide his students with quality teaching. Two of the concerns came from other staff and one is from a parent you listened to at the latest school get-together.

The word 'concerns' is used because no-one has specifically used the words 'complaint' or 'competency', or committed their views to paper. What do you do?

Team development

It is 1 June. Your new school’s teachers are used to a model of in-service training that fits around going to courses, occasional visits to other schools to observe, and assistance being given to pay the fees of teachers studying for university papers.

School staff meetings are fortnightly and follow a pattern of dealing with school calendar events and administrative process. After 6 months of observation and listening, you have come to the conclusion that all the staff would benefit from dialogue and collaboration about how to achieve the teaching and learning goals laid out in the school's strategic plan. How will you set about progressing your idea?

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