![]() Other former staff who were paid appear to not have made minimum wage. Several reported other potential violations of state and federal labor laws. VICE spoke with other graduates who became paid instructors for the studios after the apprenticeship program. She was never scheduled to teach at that location again. Although she was told no, the next day, Anna says she received a verbally abusive call from the same studio manager reprimanding her for not closing properly. She asked her manager if there was additional protocol to follow. When Anna was a class or two away from being paid for her work, she says, she was charged with closing down the studio for the first time. “After graduating from teacher training, I began my 25-class ‘apprenticeship,’” said Anna, a former teacher whose name has been changed because she feared her professional reputation would be damaged. Yoga to the People studio documents obtained by VICE indicate that the company may have been fully aware of the money they were saving by utilizing the “apprentices” to teach, instead of paid staff. Staff teachers reported being paid $35 per class, and assert that Yoga to the People stood to save $875 for every “apprentice” that completed the program, or $131,250 per year per class. This overlap may have ensured a steady stream of free labor for company use. Josephine told VICE that the “apprenticeship program” meant paid staff got smaller paychecks “whenever there was a new batch of ‘apprentices’ to schedule instead.” Occasionally, Josephine said, the length and frequency of the “apprenticeship program” meant two programs could happen concurrently, with a new one beginning before the previous had ended. In New York State, where employees say Yoga to the People frequently engaged unpaid apprentices to teach classes, the Department of Labor has a detailed fact sheet that states that in order to be considered a non-employee, an intern must not displace paid employees with the work they do. But the structure of the Yoga to the People’s program that sources have described more closely resembles that of an unpaid internship, which for-profit businesses are legally allowed to utilize so long as the intern in question doesn’t meet specific federal stipulations of being in an “ employee relationship” with the business. The Federal Department of Labor defines an apprenticeship as a paying job. The schedule, they say, was secret from students. Staff teachers at Yoga to the People report being explicitly told they were not allowed to advertise when or where they were teaching classes, which made them unable to encourage attendance. “That puts you in this loophole of ‘teaching’ something like 12 classes a week, but not getting paid,” as the classes never took place. “If the class doesn’t open or gets cancelled,” due to low student turnout, “you don’t get paid, despite preparing or cleaning the room,” which Thomas says could take an extra one to two hours of work. Mark’s location in Manhattan, once you got scheduled to teach for pay (and not as an apprentice) you weren’t actually guaranteed payment either. According to Josephine, a former “salaried” manager at one of the studio’s New York locations (whose name has been changed out of fear of company retaliation), “apprenticing just meant you were asked to teach 25 classes for free.”Īccording to Thomas, at Yoga to the People’s St. Yoga to the People verbally offered graduates of the Teacher Training program (referred to as “TTs”) the opportunity to “apprentice” for the company. According to multiple graduates and teachers, the 200-hour course cost each of its 50 participants $3,200, ran three times per year, and earned the company up to $160,000 each session, or, up to $480,000 annually. To work for Yoga to the People, most instructors were required to first graduate from the company’s Teacher Training program. According to a former “salaried” manager, “apprenticing just meant you were asked to teach 25 classes for free.”
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