Christmas could come early for more than 30,000 school support staff set to receive a living wage.
Teacher aides, therapists and administration staff have welcomed the offer but say there's still a long way to go.
Ally Kemplen has been a teacher aide at Auckland's Newton Central School for 21 years.
She oversees five others like her and says all of them get paid below the living wage.
"We've had to provide food parcels for people we've had to put all sorts of financial supports in place for people," Kemplen told Newshub.
Kemplen says teacher aide work is often the most challenging job in education, and that stress is only compounded by financial worry.
"It's really embarrassing to say I do this really important work and I'm really broke, and I've run out of money or I'm having trouble paying my rent," she says.
The primary school teachers' union, NZEI, says that's the reality for 90 percent of teacher aides - but that could be about to change.
The Ministry of Education is offering a minimum base pay rate and living wage of $21.15 an hour for all school support staff.
Staff currently earning at or above that rate will receive a 3 percent increase. All workers will then receive a further increase of 3 percent in a years time.
"The government has made around $59 million dollars per annum in additional funding available so that we can make this offer, it will be provided into schools operational grants," Ministry of Education spokesperson Ellen MacGregor-Reid said.
NZEI says it's a welcome move but its members have mixed emotions.
"It will make a significant difference for them ... But we do have people for whom it's only going to make a little difference," NZEI President Linda Stuart.
That's because they're still fighting for pay equity with the gender pay gap upwards of 12 percent.
"What we need to see is a significant jolt to pay for them, but not just pay, but job security and also professional development," Stuart said.
"We would hope within the coming year, the 2020 year that we would have a settlement on the table for teachers to consider for pay equity," MacGregor-Reid added.
The union will now vote on the latest offer with a decision likely next week.
