Beginning March 11, the daily wage for substitute teachers working in Irvine Unified School District will rise from $95 to $110 per day. Retired Irvine teachers will be able to make $120 daily if they return to the classroom as substitute teachers.

“Substitute teachers normally do not teach so it’s not fair to raise their wage.” sophomore Yuri Jo said.

Jo argues that it is not fair to raise the pay for substitutes when, in her experience, they just sit at a desk.

“It’s a raise but its still not as much as some people think subs should earn because I think subs are very important.” former teacher and longtime substitute Rosamary Rauch said.

The main reason for the raise was to equalize the pay between Irvine and the surrounding school districts.

“Well, our neighboring school districts all pay their substitutes more than we pays ours,” principal’s secretary Jaime Klopfer said. “So I think that was one reason, so we could make sure we have competitive rates.”

Klopfer also added that the margin of the difference of pay was only a small amount, somewhere around 10 to 15 dollars. Although the amount between wages for substitutes in Irvine and other districts is very small, some are hopeful the raise will fulfill the recent lack of available substitutes.

Rauch thought that the raise may help bring back substitutes that moved to other districts to make more money.

“[The pay raise] is to motivate teachers to teach in Irvine, a fantastic school district, instead of going outside where they pay more,” former substitute and student teacher Karen Bunnell said.