I substitute teach at the local high school during the school year. School ends, I have no income for the summer. But since I have “reasonable assurance” of a job after school starts, I can’t collect unemployment benefits.
WTF? I am unemployed for two months, whether or not they might call me back in the fall to work. There is NO guarantee that I will have work in the fall, just a speculation that I might get called in at some point after school starts. Maybe early September, maybe late April. But maybe someday I’ll have work… Or not.
But I definitely will not work during the summer. Maybe in the fall, but I WILL NOT GET PAID FOR THAT JOB ALL SUMMER.
So right now, I have no job and no income. And no promise of work on a certain day ever in the future. But I am not unemployed because I might work someday, maybe?
I am looking for work. I was actually hired to teach three summer college classes, but nobody signed up, so no income.
Can somebody explain this thought process to me? How am I not unemployed if I do not have a job and am not making money and have no set date to return to employment?
Oops, I left this out. It’s from the Vermont Dept. of Labor website-
"Reasonable Assurance for Individuals Who Work for a School
Individuals who work for a school and are unemployed between terms (for example, during the summer) or during a break in the school schedule during the school year, are not allowed to use the wages earned in this type of employment provided the individual has a reasonable assurance of returning to work for a school at the end of the break. If you started the break or are between terms and do not have a reasonable assurance of returning to work, you may be paid unemployment benefits. If during this time you receive an offer of work from a school, you must notify the department immediately. Likewise, if you had a reasonable assurance of returning to work and for some reason you no longer have a reasonable assurance, call Claimant Assistance."
Same with NJ. If you work for a school you don’t collect over the breaks. However if you claimed all summer long and end up not returning in September because there is no work you will be paid for the summer.
The teachers I know tell me they are paid a 12 month wage for a nine to ten month school year. It’s up to the teacher to prorate expenses so the money lasts during the summer. At the same time it doesn’t prevent them from getting a summer job.
Are you suggesting that the teachers you know are paid a higher rate when they substitute than when they work in permanent appointments, so that a the total reumeration for subbing from September to June is the same as the total remuneration over twelve months for a permanent teacher?
I think Duckster’s saying that teachers are often not paid over the summer. That is, my mom’s a teacher, and she has the option of being paid ten times, for the months she works (with two of those being smaller, since part of June and September are off) or twelve times, evenly throughout the year.
Basically, the salary is a fixed amount, and takes summers into account.
As for the OP, I’d say it sounds a lot like being a freelancer - just because you’re not working constantly, doesn’t mean you’re unemployed (in the state’s eyes, anyways).
AIUI, subbing is paid on a more-or-less per-diem basis. The sub is called to school x to teach for y days. At the end of each workday, the sub turns a slip in to some office so s/he can be paid, sort of the way a regular temp is paid. If the sub doesn’t work, s/he doesn’t get paid, period.
IIRC, traditional temps (e.g. people who work for Kelly or Aerotek or any other temporary agency) are in the same boat. They’re not paid for the time they don’t work, and since they have “reasonable assurance” of future employment, they can’t collect unemployment. It does suck, but there you are.
The view that a substitute teacher has a “reasonable assurance” of future employment seems at least debateable. If I’m a teacher at high school level, presumably there are a limited range of subject which I can credibly be appointed to teach, and a limited number of high schools within striking distance of my home. My getting a job next September depends on a permanent teacher in a subject that I can teach at one of these schools being sick, resigning or otherwise being temporarily or suddenly unavailable, doesn’t it? How “assured” can I be that this will happen, and that I will secure the substitute appointment? I would have thought that “reasonable assurance” about this was more the exception than the rule, no?
Some school districts don’t require a certified teacher for subsituting. My school district only requires a high school education for subbing, provided the assignment is less than one month in duration. In practice this means a licensed teacher is hired for one day after the sub has worked one month, then the sub is back the next day. I never got unemployment in the summers, either.
The main requirement for a sub is a pulse and no felony convictions. Some states or districts require a college degree. Very, very few require teacher certifications, and I’d be shocked if ANY required certification in the subject area.
Understand that subs make nothing–$70/day here in Texas, I think, and when I was in Alabama ten years ago it was $50/day. No benefits or PTO. You can’t be picky when you are paying wages like that. Because of that, honestly, most subs I know work every day that they want to during the school year, especially if they themselves are not picky.
I do joke that you can tell when the economy is in the crapper because we get much better subs–it’s a good gig for someone looking for work. But when unemployment falls under 5%, we have really weird subs.
Similar problem for adjuncts at Universities–and somewhere on the net (maybe at the Chronicle of Higher Ed website?) there was an article about how adjuncts in some states are starting to agitate about this. “Reasonable assurance of employment” is apparently not supposed to be established (in some states at least) just by a signed letter from the school saying they want to keep the option open of maybe hiring you next fall if there are classes available. And indeed–there’s nothing assuring about that. For reasonable assurance, you’d need to know how often people in this situation actually do get rehired (it seems to me). This, roughly, is the case the adjuncts are starting to make.
Probably something similar could apply for subs.
There’s also a movement to form a national adjuncts’ union… there are legal problems for this concerning subs, though, in many states, if I understand correctly. (Teachers can’t be in unions in a lot of states.)
I would think the logic is simple. It’s so that businesses can’t abuse the unemployment system to subsidize their seasonal workers.
Without that provision, a business could say “We’ll only pay you 10 months a year. But you’ll get unemployment for the other two, so your effective salary will be $X per year.”
Some places you can get unemployment, but in some states subs are specifically excluded.
This all depends on how you are classed. Are subs actually temps? Or are they fully and gainfully employed employees working 40 hours per week at various jobs in different places?
A lot goes into the determaining process for getting unemployment. This also includes the fact you must be looking for work actively and you must be willing to take PERMANENT jobs.
If you go into unemployment with the attitude of “I just want the money and have no intention of looking for another job and even if I get a job, I intend to quit in September” this is bad for you. Because you’ve said, “I don’t want a permanent job.”
Nothing to do with substitute teaching, but I remember reading, I think in Allan Sherman’s autobiography, that Harpo Marx used to collect unemployment between movies.
I used to work at a proprietary college. When it closed down and we teachers were unemployed, we were denied unemployment because it was summer and we were teachers. It still pisses me off and it was 15 yrs ago.
I know one or two fellow Census workers who were denied unemployment because they were offered jobs in other operations when the ones they were working on ended, but turned them down for reasons the state considered not good enough.