Central Noble Community School Corp. is privatizing its substitute teachers, which could help increase the number of available subs and reduce the administrative workload for school staff.
The new service shouldn’t cost any more than what the district already is spending, but it will eliminate the headache of managing the substitute pool by outsourcing the duties.
The Board of Education at its meeting Aug. 23 agreed to enter a contract through the end of the 2017-18 school year with Professional Educational Service Group for substitute teacher management. Board members approved the agreement 4-0, with board member John McGill absent.
PESG hires substitute teachers as its own employees, handling payroll as well as providing benefits, including health insurance and carrying liability insurance, for its workers. Substitutes go through some training through PESG to ready them to go into the classroom. In Indiana, substitute teachers are only required to have a high school diploma, so they may not have any formal education training, PESG Business Director Troy Ruger said.
The firm will attempt to hire all of the current Central Noble subs, as well as attempt to recruit new employees, too, Ruger said.
“We go out, we find those people,” Ruger said.
PESG also provides an online calendar with postings for daily classroom openings, and subs are able to pick and choose their schedule in advance, if possible. That can create a wider opportunity for subs, especially if there are multiple school districts using the service.
As of now, Central Noble will be the first district in northeast Indiana to sign on to PESG’s program, but it is also pitching the service to other area school district including East Noble School Corp., Smith-Green Community School Corp. and Whitley County Consolidated Schools, Ruger said.
“That would be a big consortium of subs that would make sense for this area,” Ruger said.
One of the major administrative benefits would be having PESG manage rules with the federal Affordable Care Act and who is eligible or not eligible for health insurance coverage based on the number of hours they work, Central Noble Assistant Superintendent Troy Gaff said.
That’s the main benefit of going with the firm as opposed to just partnering with neighboring school districts to share substitutes, Gaff said after being asked by board President Rodney Stayner.
“That helps with our sub pool, but doesn’t help with the management side,” Gaff said.
PESG charges an additional percentage on top of the district’s rate for substitutes, $70 per day, which would put the cost around $85 per day, Gaff said, but hiring the firm will save employees time that can be used for other tasks, creating an in-kind savings.
“It’s essentially a wash,” Gaff said.