JTA(Jamaica Teachers' Association) reports that most teachers that have devoted 25 to 40 years to the sector are not being paid timely if at all. JTA President La Sonja Harrison reports tears to be the only source of refuge for some and demotivation as the impending result. One teacher in particular was paid under $2,000 for two consecutive months.

'Disingenuous' 

JTA accuses ministry of giving teachers random salaries to quell non-payment reports

8 May 2023/Kimone Francis/ Senior Staff Reporter

THE JAMAICA Teachers’ Association (JTA) is forecasting that more educators will leave the sector in the coming months amid frustration over continued discrepancies with their salaries.

In a Gleaner interview on Friday, JTA President La Sonja Harrison Harrison accused the education and finance ministries of being lethargic in addressing what she said were “very serious” concerns.

Harrison said that the JTA has written to the ministries about the incorrect salaries of scores of teachers but to date, there has been no response.

She said that teachers have been sharing their pay slips for the last three months with the union, which has been assessing the documents for discussions with the ministries.

Harrison said the bulk of teachers affected are those with between 25 and 40 years of service to the sector.

“Those teachers are crying. Those teachers are not happy at all because even the payment that they were to receive last month, it has not materialised … . There are nuances to the teaching profession coming out of the compensation review that have not left the teachers encouraged. They have not been motivated,” said Harrison.

A teacher who wrote to The Gleaner recently said that she received a net salary of $724 in March after the education ministry insisted that she was being overpaid.

The guidance counsellor, who

teaches at the secondary level, said that she thought the matter would have been addressed the following month, but to her surprise, she was paid only $1,200 in April.

She disclosed in a Gleaner follow-up that $106,000 was withdrawn from her salary to recoup the ‘overpaid’ amount.

“Is this really what the Government of Jamaica thinks I am worth? After one whole month of dedicating my time, energy, and resources, finally it is now payday and I was paid $724. As a consequence of this, I was not able to pay any bills, buy any food, or do any basic necessities needed for survival,” the teacher, who has since resigned, lamented.

“I went through all the proper channels to air my concern, and to this date, absolutely no one has tried to resolve the situation. The hurt and trauma that this has caused me has really taken a toll on my health in every aspect,” added the teacher, who said that her take-home salary was $60,000 in February.

She told The Gleaner that there were multiple errors on her pay advice, including amounts taken for overpayment that she claimed she had not been notified about and amounts paid over to institutions that she said she had “absolutely” no business with.

She said the school’s principal also attempted to get the matter resolved through the ministry, but this did not yield any results.

She said that she was aware of others experiencing similar challenges.

Put to Harrison, the JTA president charged that there are persons who the ministry “just paid an amount” to quell any reports about nonpayment of salaries.

“So I could not report that they didn’t get paid. That is not their salaries, but it is disingenuous,” she told The Gleaner.

“One teacher has been teaching for 31 years. She’s now a viceprincipal. March month end, she received $58,000. Even if she was going home with $0.00, $58,000 couldn’t be the money she got as her retro. The next month, which would be April, what did she get? A whopping $59,000! I saw it for myself,” Harrison said.

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The JTA president warned that “the nation must brace itself” for the quality of education it will see.

“We will see the true impact of this exercise in a few months to come. If this is how we treat the teachers, the persons who serve our children, the in loco parentis – the parents in the absence of birth parents – we need to take stock and wake up in this country,” said Harrison.

Meanwhile, there is growing tension among regional coordinators in the education ministry, who claim that the reclassification exercise has not benefited them.

Among those affected are regional literacy, special needs, and mathematics coordinators.

The group, largely made up of contract workers, has argued that there is disparity among contract workers assigned to the education ministry as only some groups have been reclassified and have received new salary packages as of April 2023.

“It stands to reason then that the Ministry of Finance, in its arrangements, has made similar if not the same provisions for some groups of contract workers but not other groups of contract workers. The groups not only got new salaries, but also lump-sum retroactive salaries,” a regional coordinator, who asked not to be identified, told The Gleaner.

“This is brewing, and I foresee the pipes bursting if the latter groups are not given urgent attention, ”the regional coordinator added.

The group is not represented by the JTA.

The Gleaner was told that workers on contract whose salaries were not reclassified are not aligned to posts, which “renders the process of putting the workers on a salary scale impossible”.

Further, the coordinator said multiple members of the affected groups listed have been working on contracts for more than 10 years.

“These are persons with families and who are already disenfranchised because they do not benefit from concession to purchase vehicles, CUG (closed user group) phones to place the myriad calls that must be made, roll-over vacation leave, and job security. So uncertainties are high, especially as a contract ends,” the complainant said.

Acting permanent secretary in the Ministry of Education, Maureen Dwyer, did not respond to The Gleaner’s request for comment via email on Friday.

Calls placed to her cell phone were also not answered.

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