Family and Medical Leave Act Basics As school district employees, you are covered by several federal employment laws designed to protect you from undue loss of employment or discrimination on a variety of bases. One of the federal leave laws designed to assist working families is the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).
During a 12-month period, an eligible employee under the two new service-member applications is entitled to a combined total of 26 workweeks. Under FMLA, upon your return from a qualified period of leave, your employer must return you to the same position you held before taking the leave or to an "equivalent position" as it relates to pay, benefits and other terms of employment. In addition, for employees who have group health-insurance coverage, employers must continue to maintain the coverage on the same terms while an employee is on qualified FMLA leave. However, if at the end of a period of qualified leave, the employee chooses not to return to work, even though he or she is able, the employer is entitled to be repaid for insurance premiums it has paid for the entire leave period. The Act gives employers some flexibility in how they administer FMLA leave. For instance, although FMLA leave is unpaid leave, an employer may, by published policy, permit or require employees to use or apply any applicable paid leave as part of the 12-week period. In addition, employers may elect one of several methods for determining the 12-month period within which leave may be taken, but that election must be published in the employer's policy or provided in written form to employees. If the policy is not properly published, employees may use the method that is most favorable to them in calculating the amount of leave they may take. Thus, our standard mantra rings true: Check your local school-board policy to see how your district's FMLA policy is administered. For more detailed information regarding the Family and Medical Leave Act, check the U.S. Department of Labor information page here. If you have a specific situation with which you need assistance, please contact NWPE at (800) 380-6973.
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