What are discretionary hours and how do they work in Juniorlogs?
A discretionary hour is an hour that a service can claim an Other Teacher as a Certificated Teacher for the purposes of the Staff Hour Count.
Services that must complete the Staff Hour Count may record the hours worked by relievers who are Other Teachers as Certificated Teacher Hours for the purposes of the Staff Hour Count for up to 40 (60 – effective 1/10/2019 to 31/05/2020) hours during the funding cycle.
Discretionary hours are used to help maintain funding rates, where an appropriately qualified reliever cannot be found to cover certificated teacher absences.
Certificated teacher absences and discretionary hours
Services should maintain a list of certificated relievers who are available when certificated teachers are absent.
The Ministry will accept up to 40 (60 – effective 1/10/2019 to 31/05/2020) discretionary hours per funding period (to maintain current rates of funding) when certificated relievers are not available, provided that the record keeping requirements described in this section are met.
Services may record the hours worked by relievers who are Other Teachers as Certificated Teacher Hours for the purposes of the Staff Hour Count for 40 hours during the funding cycle. Services may choose which hours these apply to – they do not have to apply to the first 40 hours.
Increase to discretionary hours
Additionally, there is a temporary increase to the number of discretionary hours available to teacher-led centre-based services. This increase will extend discretionary hours from 40 to 60 hours per funding period, effective from 1 October 2019 until 31 May 2020.