Teacher aides are celebrating today after receiving a hefty boost to their bank accounts with their new fair pay rate coming through for the first time.
It comes after an historic pay equity claim for 22,000 teacher aides in public schools was settled with the Ministry of Education at the end of May.
Newton Central School teacher aide and fair pay campaigner Ally Kemplen said it feels like waking up on Christmas morning after receiving the increase, back-paid from February, last night.
"It's been a really long time coming and it's finally here," she said.
The teacher aide organised a breakfast for staff to celebrate before school this morning.
"We're just all starting to experience what that's going to be like and being able to make some more choices being paid fairly," she said.
Kemplen said she'll now be able to buy a washing machine instead of going to the laundromat.
"That's going to be pretty cool to walk into a shop and say, 'I'll have that one please.'"
She said the result serves as a "giant blow" to gender-pay inequity.
The increased pay rate acknowledges that the work of teacher aides supporting children with their learning at school has been undervalued historically because it has mainly been done by women, with discriminative perceptions that "women's work" is less worthy.
"We're just the beginning of it for school support staff, we've got our admin staff coming next and the rest of support staff in schools but it's also about valuing the children that we work with and the work that we do as being really important," Kemplen said.
She advised other workers that feel undervalued because of their gender to work together with other staff to campaign for change and not give up.
The new pay rates will see teacher aides on the most common rate move from $21.31 per hour to $26.54, with another pay rise to $27.34 per hour this month, according to the Ministry of Education.
The majority of teacher aides have received a pay rise of 19 to 30 per cent from their pay rate in October last year.
In June 2016, the New Zealand Educational Institute advised the Ministry of Education of the claim, with an 18-month investigation taking place through to mid-2019.
This Saturday, the Equal Pay Amendment Act comes into force with the hope it'll provide an easier pathway for people suffering from gender-based discrimination to get fair pay.
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