How Raymore-Peculiar School District is Making Substitute Teaching More Attractive

Next year the standard substitute pay rate will rise modestly, but the timing of pay periods can still be challenging for people with thinner financial margins. The district issues payroll twice a month, but wages are paid about 2 weeks behind when work is completed.

That’s why Dr. Hatfield jumped at the chance when she heard about Wagestream, a service being rolled out through Frontline’s Absence Management. Wagestream allows substitutes who voluntarily enroll in the program to access some of their earned wages immediately — a process known as “flexible pay.”

Flexible Pay with No Implementation Needed

Dr. Hatfield says her Chief Financial Officer first heard about the program. “She just sent it to me and said, ‘Hey, have you seen this? I think this would be a great benefit for our subs.’” Although the idea was new to her, as they explored the program and learned that it would not require significant effort on the part of the district or technical integration with payroll, they decided to go for it. “The reason we decided to go ahead and activate the app for our staff, our substitutes, is that it seemed like pretty much a no-brainer. There was no impact to the district. It seemed like a benefit for our staff, our substitutes.”

Implementation was quick and simple, going live just a couple of weeks after Dr. Hatfield first heard about Wagestream. Although she wondered what they might need to do on the payroll side to activate it, she found the process required no extra work or setup from the team at Raymore-Peculiar. “We really haven’t had to work with anybody. There was no implementation on us. I just sent an email communicating with all my substitutes. There hasn’t been a need for support or interaction.”

Gearing Up for Next Year

Dr. Hatfield says she will communicate with substitutes about Wagestream again before next school year begins. She plans to include information about it in the summer training for substitutes and hopes that Wagestream will help increase fill rates and be an incentive for substitutes who want to teach but might choose to work elsewhere for financial reasons. “I want to attract more substitutes to the district. I want to help them see this as a viable full-time job. I don’t know that $14.50 an hour is going to do that for them. And when you can go to Sam’s Club and make $15, $16, $17 an hour…we’re different in the public sector.”

“It’s very difficult to wait the two weeks in between payrolls,” she says. “Some districts only pay monthly, so I could see this being even a bigger benefit for those school districts.”