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Disability & Dyslexia Team (DDT)
Code of Practice: Casual Contract Support Worker
Academic Support Workers (ASW)
Academic Support Workers (ASWs) are employed on a casual basis, the university pays National Insurance and Income Tax on the worker’s behalf, and workers are eligible for annual leave. The hours of the post are dictated by the support needs and course requirements of the students allocated to the ASW.
1. Arrangements and allocations
i. ASWs are employed as casual staff on a zero-hour contract. The university cannot guarantee hours per week, term or year. All allocations are made as per the student’s support needs, the course requirements and the funding available.
ii. Upon receiving notification of a student’s support needs, the Disability and Dyslexia Team (DDT) will contact ASWs on their database and offer work. Work is allocated based on the requirements of each student, location of the assignment and availability of the ASW along with areas of specialism/interest of the ASW.
iii. It is the responsibility of the support worker to keep the DDT up to date with any changes to their contact details, qualifications and to provide an indication of their availability.
iv. ASWs are employed at a level dependant on their experience and background and the type of work they are expected to do. Very occasionally ASWs may be offered work by the DDT which is payable at one of the other rates. It is up to the ASW to decide whether they wish to accept this work.
2. Role and Responsibilities
Students and ASW:
• Arrive at agreed meeting point on time.
• Give at least 24 hour’s notice of cancellation, where possible.
• Adhere to role/responsibilities agreed in initial meeting, and always check with relevant member of staff before making any changes.
• Agree who will inform and introduce ASW to teaching staff if relevant.
• Exchange all relevant contact details at initial meeting and advise of any changes immediately.
• All information between ASW and students shall be kept strictly confidential.
Students:
• Provide DDT with study timetable before the start of each term/semester, including placement and fieldwork dates etc.
• Attend lectures as usual.
• Provide paper and pens as required for the ASW.
• Sign ASW Monthly Support Record at the end of each session.
• When necessary, advise Support Worker and DDT of any room or timetable changes as soon as they are known.
• Respect professional role of ASW and the limits of their brief.
ASW:
• Attend all sessions booked as agreed with DDT.
• If unable to attend a session, advise DDT and student as soon as possible.
• Where necessary, position themselves in the lecture as agreed with student.
• Maintain professional boundaries.
• At no time should an ASW be involved in helping with, writing or correcting essays, independently reading up on background material for the student, commenting on projects, teaching or explaining in detail the content of a lecture.
• Advise DDT of any change in circumstances and contact details.
• Complete and submit all paperwork to the DDT as requested.
i. ASWs should adhere to the role agreed with student and Support Officer at initial contact.
ii. If assisting in lectures or seminars ASWs should not interrupt or contribute at any time. If for any reason the content has been unclear, please consult the student at the end of the session, to agree an appropriate response. Unless it is an identified element of the ASW role, it is not their responsibility to liaise with teaching staff in relation to teaching style or content.
iii. Where the ASW is note-taking in lectures, it is up to the student as to whether they sit side-by-side or not. Some students may prefer to be independent within the lecture others may need to sit next to the note-taker in order to see the notes as they are written. This should be discussed and agreed at the initial meeting.
iv. It is generally the student’s responsibility to advise the lecturer of the presence of their note-taker and introduce them if appropriate. It is important that the lecturer knows that the ASW is not just another student.
v. If the student does not arrive at the beginning of a lecture it is best to take a seat near to an exit door of a lecture room. It is useful to have started to make notes from the beginning of the session in case the student arrives late. However if the student does not arrive and you have not been informed to do otherwise, you should leave after 20 minutes.
Before leaving the university site the ASW should contact the DDT office to check whether there is any similar work that needs covering during the student’s absence. Please see section 6 for further information.
vi. Occasionally ASWs will be required to support a student on placement. Where this occurs, discussions about the nature of the role will take place with the support worker, the student, the DDT and the school.
vii. ASWs must not get directly involved with the student’s personal life. If an issue arises the Support Worker should contact the DDT to discuss the situation.
viii. Where a student chooses to make a complaint against staff or circumstances at the university, ASWs may, if they feel able to, write a letter to back-up the student’s point of view, at the student’s request. Further advocacy and support in appeals and complaints however, are the remit of the Students’ Union. As an employee of the university the ASW cannot act as an advocate for the student in such circumstances.
3. Payment Claims
All ASWs will receive a Monthly Support Record, an Additional Hours Record and an SS1 claim form to record information about the support that has taken place and the hours the worker is entitled to claim for in order that payment can be made.
i. Monthly Support Records (MSR):
ASWs must record information regarding what support was provided during the session and the time they are claiming for on the MSR. It is essential that the student signs the MSR after each session. This is to satisfy the requirements of students’ funding authorities and our auditing processes. If the MSR is not signed by the student then there may be a delay to your payment while we chase this evidence. ASWs must only record the actual hours spent with the student on the MSR and must not include any waiting or top-up time on this form.
ia. Additional Hours Record:
In order to receive payment for any ‘waiting time’ payment - as detailed in section 4, ASWs must submit an Additional Hours Record with their MSRs and SS1 claim form. This form will be cross referenced with your MSRs so that the DDT Finance Officer can verify the additional waiting hour(s) that the ASW is entitled to claim and organise payment of these.
ii. SS1 claim forms:
Towards the end of the month ASWs should transfer the information on the MSR(s) onto the SS1 claim form. Separate SS1 claim forms are needed for any work that is completed on different pay rates. The DDT will advise you of the rate of pay when the booking is made.
• ASWs should only claim for actual hours spent with the student on their SS1 claim form. Top-up time is an automatic allocation given to every ASW and will be added by the Finance Officer on receipt of your claim form. Waiting time will also be added to claim form on ASW behalf by the Finance Officer – this will be based on information provided on Additional Hours Record form.
• All hours should be rounded up or down to the nearest 0.25 (15 minutes)
• Lunch breaks up to 1 hour per day will not be paid, as per university procedure and in line with working time regulations 1998. For further information about payment of non-contact hours see section 4.
• It is essential that the SS1 claim form is signed and dated on the back page.
The SS1 claim form needs to be returned by 2nd of the month to DDT Finance Officer, Jane Shepard, Tithe Barn, University of Brighton, BN2 4GA. All payments are made a month in arrears (as long as you have returned the completed form by the deadline) – so, for example, any work completed in September will be paid on the last working day of October. Please contact Jane with any queries about making a pay claim.
Please do not send any claim forms directly to Payroll!
4. Additional Hours Entitlement
i) All ASWs are entitled to a 20 minute ‘top-up’ payment for every hour that they work with a student. This payment will be automatically added to your SS1 claim form when you submit it and requires no action by you.
Example: ASW works 9 hours in one month – an extra 3 hours will be automatically added to ASWs pay claim when received by the Finance Officer.
This payment of an additional 20 minutes per hour is automatic and is intended to compensate ASWs for time spent filling in paperwork, discussing students’ needs, contacting student/support team and other activities.
ii) ASWs are entitled to a ‘waiting time’ payment up to a maximum of one hour per day. In order to get this additional payment you must submit an Additional Hours Record form and return it with your MSRs and SS1 claim form at the end of the month. You do not need to fill in waiting hours on the SS1 claim form yourself – as these hours will be calculated and added on for you, based on the Additional Hours Record you submit.
Please note - under no circumstances should top-up or waiting time be added to the Monthly Support Record that is signed by the student.
Waiting time will be paid in the event that the ASW is working on campus and has a gap between students or lessons. Please note that lunch hours do not count as waiting time.
Please see the following examples:
1. ASW works between 11am – 1pm and 2pm – 3pm.
• Hour between 1pm-2pm would not be paid as this is a lunch hour.
• 3 hours contact time + 1 hour top-up (3 x 20 min) = 4 hours
2. ASW works from 10am – 12pm and 2pm – 3pm
• One hour between classes would not be paid as this would be treated as lunch hour, the second hour would qualify as waiting time.
• 3 hrs contact time + 1 hr top-up (3 x 20 min) + 1 hr waiting time = 5 hours
3. ASW works from 9am - 10am, 11am – 12pm and 2pm- 3pm.
• One of the hours between classes would be paid as it would qualify as waiting time, the next hour would not be paid as it would be treated as a lunch hour, the third hour could not be paid, as a maximum of 1 hour waiting time is allowed per day.
• 3 hrs contact time + 1 hr top-up (3 x 20 min) + 1 hr waiting time = 5 hour
If you have any queries about additional time entitlement please contact Daniel Wasp Support Worker Coordinator or Jane Shepard, Finance Officer.
5. Annual Leave
i. ASWs are entitled to annual leave which can be claimed as additional pay. The amount due to each ASW is calculated on the basis of the number of hours worked during a term and paid at the ASWs usual hourly rate.
ii. At the end of every term, once the majority of claims have been submitted, the DDT’s Finance Officer will calculate the annual leave entitlement. ASWs will each be sent a claim form with the number of hours due to be paid. Check the details on the front of the form, sign the reverse and return to the DDT Finance Officer in the normal way. The hours will be paid to you at the end of the next month.
6. Travel
i. In most cases ASWs will have their nearest main site of the university as their base. No travel can be claimed between the ASWs home and their nearest university site. However there may be occasion whereby an ASW supports a student at a different site. When this is the case, an ASW will be reimbursed for travel costs accrued as long as this has been agreed by the DDT prior to the journey taking place.
ii. The cost of travel must be recorded on the Monthly Support Record and the Support Worker should fill in a TS1 claim form with details of where the journey was to, the name of the student they were supporting and the cost of the journey. The TS1 claim form is available upon request from the DDT.
Mileage is currently paid at 0.40p per mile. If using public transport it is expected that the ASW will travel using the most cost-effective method – which would usually be by bus or 2nd class train travel. Please send in your tickets and receipts for travel with the TS1 claim form.
7. Attendance and cancellations
i. Students are expected to attend appointments, or give at least 24 hour’s notice if they cannot attend. ASWs may claim for sessions cancelled with less than 24 hour’s notice.
ii. It is the joint responsibility of the Support Worker and student to inform the Support Worker Coordinator (Daniel Wasp) of student absences. In cases of repeated absences support needs and arrangements may need to be discussed.
iii. When a Support Worker has been booked to take notes, upon prior arrangement with the DDT and where the student’s non-attendance is related to their disability, the note-taker will continue to attend lectures and arrange for notes to be passed on to the student.
8. Additional Information
i. Any support that is provided to student in form of writing up notes after lectures etc should be claimed for on Monthly Support Record and not as ‘top-up’ time.
ASWs will be advised by the Support Worker Co-ordinator or Disability Support Officer from DDT how many hours support with students can be claimed in a week – and where applicable, if any additional hours after a session can be claimed for time spent on note-taking/typing up notes etc.
Please be aware that different students have different support packages and that this may affect how many hours can be provided. ASWs should always check with the Support Worker Coordinator before providing any additional hours.
ii. For further information or queries please contact the Disability and Dyslexia Team:
• Daniel Wasp - Support Work Co-ordinator
Information regarding ASW role, procedures, paperwork, allocation of students, cancellations and general queries.
Manor House, Moulescoomb Place, University of Brighton
Telephone: 01273 644114
Email: d.g.wasp@brighton.ac.uk
• Jane Shepard – Finance Officer for Disability and Dyslexia Team
Return ASW claim forms to and any queries regarding payment, pay claims, travel claims.
Part Time Mon/Wed/Fri
Tithe Barn, Moulescoomb Place, University of Brighton
Telephone: 01273 643928/ 3501 (Wed)
Email: js6@brighton.ac.uk
• Disability and Dyslexia Team
General queries
Manor House, Moulescoomb Place, University of Brighton
Telephone: 01273 643799
Email: disability@brighton.ac.uk
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Academic Support Worker Pay Rates 01/10/08
Academic Support Level 1 £9.08 per hour
Academic Support Level 2 £10.48 per hour
Academic Support Level 3 £11.12 / £11.46 / £11.79 per hour
An automatic 20 min top-up allocation is paid for every hour worked in the above posts. See section 4i) for more information
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