Substitute and Volunteer Teaching in Public Schools

TL;DR: Substitute and volunteer teaching in DepEd public schools is a mixed bag: some categories are formally paid, most are underpaid relative to a regular Teacher I's ₱31,705 basic salary, and a few run fully unpaid. Kindergarten Volunteer Teachers get a DepEd-set honorarium of ₱2,000 to ₱6,000 a month under DepEd Order No. 21, s. 2012. Substitute-teacher hiring and pay is set division by division, not by one national policy, with some divisions like Baguio City issuing explicit compensation guidelines and others leaving coverage to informal, unpaid arrangements among existing staff. Volunteer teaching experience generally earns extra points in Teacher 1 hiring rankings, which is the main long-term payoff for teachers who go this route. Republic Act No. 4670 requires at least 25% additional pay for duties beyond a teacher's normal workload, but teacher groups have repeatedly said DepEd doesn't consistently honor that on time.

Every hiring season, aspiring teachers who can't land a Teacher 1 item right away ask whether substitute or volunteer teaching is worth doing while they wait. It can be, but the honest answer depends heavily on which specific arrangement is on the table: a DepEd-recognized program with a set honorarium, a division-level substitute pool with its own pay rules, or an informal unpaid favor a principal is asking for. This guide lays out what each category actually looks like, what the rules say about paying teachers for extra work, and how (or whether) unpaid time counts toward a future Teacher 1 item. If you're still building toward that first item, start with SchoolFinderPH's guide to how to become a teacher in the Philippines.

Is Volunteer Teaching in DepEd Schools Paid?

Sometimes, and when it is, it's usually well below regular teacher pay. The clearest example is the Kindergarten Volunteer Teacher (KVT) program under DepEd Order No. 21, s. 2012, part of the Universal Kindergarten Education Program. KVTs receive a monthly honorarium of ₱3,000 for handling one class of 25-35 pupils, ₱6,000 for two classes, or ₱2,000 in multigrade or low-enrollment schools. Compare that to a Teacher I's ₱31,705 monthly basic salary under the current DBM salary schedule, and the gap is stark, even before accounting for the fact that a KVT typically carries a full teaching load.

Other volunteer arrangements are less formalized and, historically, have run entirely unpaid. DepEd's own hiring guidelines explicitly list "volunteer teachers" and "LGU-funded teachers" alongside Teacher 1 applicants as categories subject to the same hiring rules, which tells you DepEd treats volunteer service as a recognized (if lesser) category, not an anomaly. In 2014, DepEd drew criticism from the Alliance of Concerned Teachers after a memorandum discontinued the service of LGU-paid and volunteer teachers mid-shortage; the group's response at the time, through Secretary General France Castro, was pointed: "Despite the fact that we still need more teachers, DepEd instead ordered the discontinuance of their service."

Disclaimer: honorarium amounts and which volunteer categories DepEd currently recognizes can change between school years. Confirm the current honorarium and eligibility with your division office before committing to a volunteer post.

Volunteer and Substitute Arrangements at a Glance

How Does Substitute Teaching Actually Work?

Unlike the Kindergarten Volunteer Teacher program, there is no single national DepEd Order that standardizes how substitute teachers are hired or paid for covering a colleague's absence. Substitute arrangements are largely handled at the Schools Division Office level. Some divisions have formalized this: DepEd Baguio City, for instance, issued Division Memorandum No. 216, s. 2024, "Guidelines and Procedures for Hiring and Compensating Substitute Teachers," specifically to give schools a documented process (and a funding source, typically school-level Maintenance and Other Operating Expenses) for bringing in a paid substitute during an approved leave.

Where a division has not issued equivalent guidance, substitute coverage often gets absorbed informally, sometimes by splitting the absent teacher's class among colleagues, sometimes by asking a nearby teacher or volunteer to step in without additional pay. That gap between divisions with formal substitute-pay policies and divisions without one is the single biggest reason substitute teaching pay varies so much from one school to the next.

Disclaimer: whether a substitute posting is paid, and at what rate, depends on your specific division's policy. Ask the school head and the SDO directly, in writing, before agreeing to substitute coverage.

What Does the Law Actually Say About Paying Teachers for Extra Work?

Republic Act No. 4670, the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers, sets a clear floor even though it predates the current shortage-driven hiring landscape. Section 13 requires additional compensation, at least 25% of a teacher's regular remuneration, for any classroom teaching beyond the standard six hours up to eight hours a day. Section 14 sets the same 25% floor for co-curricular, out-of-school, or other duties outside a teacher's defined normal workload.

In practice, teacher advocacy groups say this isn't consistently honored. When DepEd Order No. 25 required teachers to run end-of-school-year remedial and enrichment classes without clearly settling the compensation question, Teachers' Dignity Coalition chair Benjo Basas put it bluntly: "DepEd is stealing the vacation of teachers and will force them to work for free," adding that the department had not yet released overtime pay owed from a previous school year. That dispute involved regular teachers assigned extra duties, not external volunteers, but it illustrates the same underlying pattern this guide is about: DepEd's rules on paying for extra teaching work exist on paper, and enforcement of them has been an ongoing point of friction.

Does Volunteer or Substitute Time Count Toward Future Hiring?

Generally, yes, for the recognized categories. Under DepEd's Teacher 1 hiring guidelines, teaching experience earned as a Kindergarten Volunteer Teacher or LGU-funded teacher earns extra points on top of the standard scoring system used to build the Registry of Qualified Applicants (RQA): +1 point for less than 1 year of such experience, +2 points for 1 to under 3 years, and +3 points for 3 or more years. Some divisions go further with their own local policies; DepEd Region V's Catanduanes division, for example, issued Division Memorandum No. 475, s. 2021 specifically to grant corresponding points for relevant teaching experience to volunteer teacher applicants, alongside a Certificate of Appreciation for volunteers generally.

That said, informal or undocumented volunteer coverage, the kind arranged verbally between a principal and a willing teacher-applicant with no memo behind it, is the arrangement least likely to translate cleanly into hiring points later, simply because there's no paper trail. If you take on volunteer or substitute work specifically to strengthen a future Teacher 1 application, get it documented from day one.

What About Job Order and Contract of Service Teachers?

Job Order (JO) and Contract of Service (COS) arrangements are a separate category from both volunteer and substitute teaching, used when a division needs to fill a gap outside the regular plantilla-item system. These run on a strict "no work, no pay" basis: no salary during unworked days, no GSIS or PhilHealth employer share, no Pag-IBIG contribution matching, no leave credits, and no security of tenure, a sharp contrast with the regular-item benefits detailed in SchoolFinderPH's teacher benefits guide. COS/JO engagement across government, including DepEd, is periodically updated through joint DBM-CSC-COA issuances rather than a teacher-specific policy, most recently reiterated for 2026. Anyone offered a JO/COS teaching role should treat it as materially different from even an unpaid-adjacent volunteer post, since it also carries none of the government insurance coverage that even low-honorarium KVT roles are meant to sit alongside.

Deciding Whether to Take a Substitute or Volunteer Role

• Get the pay arrangement in writing before you start. Ask specifically whether the role falls under a documented DepEd Order (like KVT) or a division memo (like a substitute-teacher policy), or whether it's an informal, undocumented favor.
• Ask how the time will be credited, not just whether it's paid. Even a low-honorarium or unpaid stint can be worth it if it's properly logged toward Teacher 1 ranking points; an undocumented one usually isn't.
• Know the difference between a KVT role, a division substitute posting, and a JO/COS position before agreeing, since the pay, benefits, and paper trail differ significantly across all three.
• If asked to cover extra duties without pay, RA 4670's 25% additional-compensation floor is the legal baseline to raise with your school head or SDO, even if enforcement has historically been uneven.
• Track everything yourself. Keep copies of any deployment order, memo, or written agreement; DepEd's ranking committees rely on documentation, not memory, when crediting prior teaching experience.

Ready to find the right school? Browse schools or compare tuition, requirements, and teaching career resources across hundreds of Philippine schools on SchoolFinderPH.

Sources

• Department of Education — DO 21, s. 2012 (Policies and Guidelines on the Implementation of the Universal Kindergarten Education Program)
• Department of Education — DO 8, s. 2023 (Participation of Teachers in Volunteer Work and Extra-Curricular Activities)
• DepEd Baguio City — Division Memorandum No. 216, s. 2024 (Guidelines and Procedures for Hiring and Compensating Substitute Teachers)
• DepEd Region V Catanduanes — Division Memorandum No. 475, s. 2021 (Granting of Corresponding Points for Relevant Teaching Experience to Volunteer Teacher Applicants)
• DepEd Region VIII — OM No. 04, s. 2026 (Revised Rules and Regulations on the Engagement of Contract of Service and Job Order Works in the Government)
• Inquirer.net — Volunteer gov't teachers regularized next year
• Inquirer.net — Teachers score unclear DepEd order
• Chan Robles — Republic Act No. 4670, the Magna Carta for Public School Teachers
• TeacherPH — DepEd Hiring Guidelines for the Remaining Teaching Positions Effective SY 2015-2016
• SchoolFinderPH — Teacher Salary in the Philippines
• SchoolFinderPH — DepEd Teacher Benefits: Bonuses, GSIS, and Loans