LITTLE ROCK — The Arkansas law that prohibits school employees from receiving unemployment benefits during academic breaks also applies to substitutes hired by contractors, provided there is a reasonable assurance that they will return the next semester, the Supreme Court found when it reversed an Arkansas Board of Review decision Thursday.
The court said any other decision would have led to an “absurd result” where substitutes hired by contractors are eligible for unemployment benefits but substitutes hired directly by school districts are not.
Justice Paul Danielson dissented.
In 2008, the Arkansas Board of Review found that a substitute teacher hired by SubTeach USA was eligible for unemployment compensation benefits because the company is not an educational institution.
SubTeach USA provides substitute teachers and other staff members in 50 Arkansas school districts. Sub-Teach USA attorney Robert Thompson said more than 1,600 Arkansas substitutes have signed letters of intent with the company. He said more than 1,100 of them taught last week.
According to the court’s decision, the contract signed between SubTeach USA and a school district states that once a substitute is assigned to a school, he is co-employed by the district.
LaJuanda Coleman, a substitute teacher in the Helena-West Helena School District, had applied for unemployment pay while not teaching that summer.
Coleman had signed a letter of intent to return to Sub-Teach USA in August 2008 when school resumed.
Arkansas Code Annotated 11-10-509 states that people providing services “for an educational institution” are not eligible for unemployment compensation between academic terms if they are likely to return for the next semester.
The Arkansas Board of Review and the Department of Workforce Services had interpreted the statute to mean that the worker had to be employed by an educational institution to be disqualified for the benefit.
During oral arguments before the Supreme Court on Oct. 21, SubTeach USA argued that though Coleman was employed by the company, she was providing a service for the district.
Thompson argued that the statute does not require the person who performs the service for the educational institution to be employed by the institution.
The court found that the board “erroneously read such a requirement into the plain language of the statute.”
The decision states that the court will interpret the statute just as it is read “giving the words their ordinary and usually accepted meaning in common language.”
The board’s decision did not include a ruling on whether the letter of intent between Coleman and Sub-Teach USA constituted a contract or reasonable assurance of her return.
The court remanded the case to the Board of Review to determine whether the SubTeach USA letter of intent is sufficient under Arkansas Code Annotated 11-10-509(c)(2).
The code states that the individual is not eligible for unemployment pay only if “there is a reasonable assurance that the individual will perform the services in the period immediately following the vacation period or holiday recess.”
In his dissent, Danielson stated that Coleman provided a service to an educational institution, not for an educational institution as the statute requires. Instead, he wrote, she performed a service for SubTeach USA, which then contracted her services to a school district.
He stated that the General Assembly could have chosen to specifically preclude benefits to people employed by educational contractors but chose not to.
At the Supreme Court, the case is 09-1576, SubTeach USA v. Artee Williams, director of Department of Workforce Services, and LaJuanda Coleman.
Arkansas, Pages 11 on 10/29/2010