Overview
In order to ensure the rights of private-school teachers in terms of receiving the minimum wage requirement and summer months salaries, “Stand Up with the Teacher” campaign was established in 2015 with the support of the National Committee for Pay Equity (NCPE) and organized by the Ahl Foundation. The campaign has achieved several successes until 2017 when they lunched the #our_salary_in_the_bank hashtag which began as an online campaign on the 25th of September 2017. It ended with a sit-in of private-school female teachers in front of the Ministry of Education and resulted in transferring teachers’ salaries to bank accounts or electronic wallets is compulsory for all private schools.
Employers force teachers who don’t wish to continue working in the same school for the next year into resignation at the end of each scholastic year, in order to pay salaries for nine months instead of 12 and this process also results in teachers losing their social security rights. There are many violations committed by several private schools regarding the salaries of their employees, such as paying monthly salaries lower than the minimum wage, deducting from salaries unlawfully, and many other types of violations. And in case of teachers issue complaints to Directorates of Labour, ministry’s inspectors penalise violators with fines for committing abuses of workers' rights, however, employers prefer to pay the pecuniary penalty over giving teachers their full rights, so imposing pecuniary penalty on errant employers’ dose not lead to behavior modification.
Teachers thus work without any guarantee of receiving their salaries. These violations on teachers’ rights may be directly reflected on students negatively; the teachers won’t be able to perform properly when they face rights infringement. So, getting their salaries transferred to their bank accounts or electronic wallets is the only way for teachers to prove it when a violation is committed.
In 2013, National Committee for Pay Equity carried out a survey related to private-education sector wages, which showed that 27 percent of the teachers participated in the assessment receive a monthly salary below the minimum wage (190 JD) and 37 percent receive JD 190.
Through Facebook, the campaign shares on its page posts about “teachers' right in receiving the minimum wages, maternity and breastfeeding leaves stipulated in labour, and social security law, and the unified labour contract; its format and duration,” stating that “in case of contract renewal, it must start at the date when the previous contract ends by mutual consent, this to ensure the rights for both, and to ensure that teachers receive their summer months salaries.”
In 2017, “Stand Up with the Teacher” campaign conducted an online survey lasted for three days where 1362 private-school female teachers participated in order to shed light on the issue of transferring salaries to the bank. the questions were about the minimum wage, if their salaries is transferred to banks, reasons of why not being transferred. The campaign called on the Ministry of Education and the Social Security department to find a mechanism to ensure that salaries of teachers are transferred to banks and those salaries are not paid in cash.
On February 28, 2018, "Stand Up with the Teacher" campaign culminated in submitting position paper signed by 90 decision-makers in Jordan showing the key findings of the teachers' survey to the Minister of Education.
As a result of this tactic and the campaign hard work, as well as the collaboration with the Ahl Foundation, the National Committee for Pay Equity, and the International Labor Organization, mission was accomplished in March 24, 2018. Now, it is required for all private schools to be licensed is to submit that teachers’ payroll is transferred to banks or electronic wallets. This will reduce the manipulation of the rights of female teachers in private schools in terms of their salaries, their right in social security, and raises.
Contact Information:
(06) 463 3288
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