Secondary teachers from around Otago will march on the streets of Dunedin today as pay negotiators for the Post Primary Teachers' Association and the Ministry of Education fail to find a way forward.
Nearly 13,000 pupils from 22 Otago secondary schools will be affected as classes are closed for the day.
The strike action is the result of PPTA members voting overwhelmingly to reject the Government's latest pay offer in secondary teachers' collective agreement negotiations.
Secondary teachers across the country want a 4% pay rise.
The Ministry of Education is offering a 1.5% increase.
Discussions around issues such as capping class sizes, free influenza immunisations for teachers, time for professional development and the provision of laptops for teachers had been shut down by ministry negotiators.
Secondary teachers and PPTA staff will march from the Exchange off John Wickliffe Plaza to the Ministry of Education's Dunedin offices in Moray Pl, where they will leave a letter for Education Minister Anne Tolley at 11.30am and release balloons.
The group will then head to the central carriageway in the Octagon to rally support for their claim, by making speeches and singing songs backed by a band of itinerant music teachers.
The group will disperse to the strains of a piper.
However, not all the strike action will involve marching or rallying.
St Hilda's Collegiate School PPTA chairman Dave Patchett said about 10 of the school's PPTA members would volunteer for a morning of work at the Orokonui Ecosanctuary.
"All our members are very comfortable with participating in the usual march/rally protests that will be happening. But with the approval of our regional chair, we felt that this volunteer work would help point out that teachers are motivated more by being able to contribute within an effective education system than by money."
PPTA president Kate Gainsford said if the ministry did not come back with an offer addressing the PPTA's claims and concerns, PPTA members would run a series of rostering-home strikes during term four, in which pupils in certain year levels would be sent home for the day.
The strike action has been criticised by Prime Minister John Key and Education Minister Anne Tolley.
