We are blessed to have so many committed teachers who devote countless hours and energy to educating our children.\u00a0 We all know our teachers are underpaid.\u00a0 What many teachers we work with don\u2019t know is just how underpaid they are if injured at work.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Under South Carolina law, a worker who is out of work as a result of a job injury is not entitled to compensation in the same amount that he\/she was making.\u00a0 Instead, the worker is entitled to weekly payments of 2\/3 of her \u201caverage weekly wage.\u201d\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n South Carolina Code of Laws <\/span>\u00a7<\/span>42-1-40 calculates \u201caverage weekly wage\u201d as follows:\u00a0 take the total wages paid for the last four quarters \u2026and divide by:<\/span><\/p>\n Here is how this works.\u00a0 Most jobs have an annual salary where a worker is employed 52 weeks out of the year.\u00a0 Assume this worker makes $40,000 per year and is injured on the job. \u00a0 Her average weekly wage would be $40,000\/52 = $769.\u00a0 This injured worker would then be entitled to 2\/3 of this amount or $512 in weekly compensation.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n Teachers and most school district employee\u2019s jobs are different.\u00a0 South Carolina Code of Laws <\/span>\u00a7<\/span>59-1-425(A) specifically provides that the school year consists of 190 days and teachers are paid for 190 days (38 weeks).\u00a0 Although a teacher is paid for 38 weeks of work, most elect to receive their paychecks stretched out and reduced over a 52-week pay period.\u00a0 As a result, when a teacher is injured at work, the school district\u2019s worker\u2019s compensation carrier is calculating the average weekly wage utilizing 52 weeks instead of 38 weeks, which unfairly dilutes the teacher\u2019s compensation. \u00a0 Why do they do this?\u00a0 Because it saves them money and most teachers aren\u2019t aware they are being cheated out of what they are entitled to.<\/span><\/p>\n An example of a recent case we took all the way up to the South Carolina Court of Appeals illustrates how significant injured teachers are being short changed by the workers compensation system.\u00a0 We represented a teacher who worked for the Charleston County School District.\u00a0 She was seriously injured breaking up a fight and required a neck and back surgery.\u00a0 She worked during the school year but not during the summer.\u00a0 Similar to the example above, our client made approximately $40,000 the year before but elected to receive her payments over a 52-week period. \u00a0 The school district\u2019s workers compensation carrier computed her average weekly wage as follows:\u00a0 $40,000\/52 = $769.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n We argued our client\u2019s wages were paid based on 38 weeks of work, not 52 weeks, and therefore her average weekly wage should be calculated as follows:\u00a0 $40,000\/38 = $1,052.\u00a0 In our case, because our teacher had two surgeries, she had permanent disability payments she was also entitled to and utilizing 38 weeks as opposed to 52 weeks made a big difference.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n The South Carolina Education Association, who is the largest organization of professional educators, filed an Amicus Curiae Brief with the Court of Appeals in support of our position because it recognized the importance of this decision for all teachers throughout the state.\u00a0 Prior to oral argument, the workers compensation carrier asked to settle and agreed to compensate our client utilizing our calculations and the case was dismissed.\u00a0 \u00a0 However, because the issue was never decided by the Court of Appeals, the school district continues to utilize 52 weeks to purposely reduce what teachers are owed.\u00a0 They will continue to do it because they have the deep pockets and don\u2019t think educators will stand up to them.\u00a0 If you are injured at work, please educate yourself and don\u2019t be afraid to fight for your rights.\u00a0 If you are injured at work and need legal representation please feel free to contact us.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Teacher\u2019s Deserve Better: How the Workers\u2019 Compensation System Cheats Educators We are blessed to have so many committed teachers who devote countless hours and energy to educating our children.\u00a0 We all know our teachers are underpaid.\u00a0 What many teachers we work with don\u2019t know is just how underpaid they are if injured at work.\u00a0\u00a0 Under South Carolina law, a worker who is out of work as a result of a job injury is not entitled to compensation in the same amount that he\/she was making.\u00a0 Instead, the worker is entitled to weekly payments of 2\/3 of her \u201caverage weekly wage.\u201d\u00a0…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[54],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2173"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":480622,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2173\/revisions\/480622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2173"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2173"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riesendurant.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2173"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\n