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In these days of increasing bills and costs a teaching assistant may appear to become a luxury for some schools. With the average wage of a TA at approximately £19,000 and with on-costs pushing that up significantly, the overall cost to a school for a TA will be £22,800. This is a necessary but significant outlay for the organisation and we would like to show you how you can mitigate this outlay with a trainee TA filling a teaching assistant vacancy!

PEAK have for the last two years been offering the L3 teaching assistant qualification within our apprenticeship programme. Indeed it was the first qualification that we offered, having had considerable experience of the qualification having employed a large number of apprentices on this course when we worked with Sunderland College. Over the years we can helped over 100 young people gain a L3 TA qualification and we are delighted that so many of these now work full-time in school or have used this as a stepping stone into teacher training. Since becoming an apprenticeship training organisation PEAK have a 100% SUCCESS RATE in this course!

We know that every business manager reading this will be interested primarily in two things – COST and SAVINGS…well let us attempt to demonstrate the difference for you.

The starting rate for the majority of apprentice TAs in the North East is at the bottom end of the apprenticeship pay range – usually they are earning £5.28 per hour! The majority of these apprentices tend to be on 35 hour a week contract and are employed on a term-time only basis. Schools calculate holiday pay differently depending on which Local Authority/MAT you are in so let us look at a 35 hour per week apprentice, employed for 39 weeks of the year with a 12.07% holiday payment. The first year cost for an apprentice TA therefore is £8,077 resulting in a SAVING TO THE SCHOOL OF £15,000.

Admittedly the apprentice wage HAS to increase for the final 6 months of their 18 month apprenticeship and legally the employer has to commit to paying them at the National Living Wage rate for their age. So the final 6 months of the apprenticeship contract would mean a cost to the school between £4,038 and £7,970 – but continuing to bear in mind that the average half-year salary plus on-costs charge to the school is £11,800 which means that the 18 month cost saving to a school can be as high as nearly £23,000 and a MINIMUM of £18,800!

We are currently working with one school that is employing 6 apprentices in teaching assistant roles. This school approached us as they were having issues employing high quality TAs and wanted to go down the apprenticeship route to attempt to train their own future workforce. PEAK did the first stage of their recruitment and were present at interviews – THIS SCHOOL ARE SAVING OVER £120,000 OVER AN 18-MONTH PERIOD – that should just cover their increases in costs for gas and electricity for the same period!

PEAK can help you with initial consultation right through to recruitment and interviews. We ensure that you hire the right candidates for your business. With apprenticeships in business admin, early years, teaching assistant, sports coaching and customer service, we have a wide selection of apprenticeships to fill a variety of roles. Our expert tutors will then guide you through the process and ensure your apprentice receives the best education. At PEAK we ensure a synergy between our apprenticeships and your business so each apprenticeship is tailored to your needs. Check out our Ofsted report or take a look at www.peak-sport.co.uk/apprenticeships for more information.