Part-time/term-time work

[Fashionably Late]

Does this exist in Australia? I am hoping to not work full time in the beginning while we get the children settled but hubby is worried about losing any money I make to childcare after school and during school holidays. We will be living in the ACT.

[Guest The Pom Queen]

There are some part time vacancies and also a lot of temp positions that move on to permanent part time and then permanent full time.

[Fashionably Late]

Thank you! That is fantastic news.

[Quoll]

In ACT - not so much. You can find part time jobs and term time jobs but unless you want to work in schools then you dont often find the two together. I guess it all depends on what your skill set is. There are untrained teacher aides (STAs) who work part time in schools but they are very lowly paid and somewhat erratic jobs - pretty casual and you wouldnt want to be relying on it for the mortgage. But, on the plus side, you dont need much by way of qualifications to wipe noses and change nappies or manage the behaviour of kids with disabilities.

 

In general I dont think the ACT is terribly parent centred - it is a bit of a cutthroat place in some regards and if you have a sick kid then there will be "looks" if you abuse the leave entitlements (assuming you arent casual and you have such things) which then impact on the workers who dont have kids. Certainly taking your sick kids or holidaying kids to work isnt that common a feature of any of the work places I have had dealings with, the general expectation is that you will make alternative arrangements. Given the high percentage of two income homes to cover large mortgage repayments there isnt much casual community support out there these days either.

 

There is a lot of competition for jobs out there too - we just advertised a very lowly paid admin position and got almost 60 applicants and interviewed 6 of them. A few years ago when the same position was advertised we had 5 applicants!