'We were on a break'—school channels Ross Gellar to deny teacher paid sick leave

By choice or by force, Illinois employers are increasingly offering paid sick leave to their employees. For instance, the city of Chicago and Cook County each have a paid sick leave ordinance, and Illinois school law requires certain school districts to provide paid sick leave to their teachers. Additionally, many employers voluntarily provide sick leave, even if their town or county doesn't require them to do so. But understanding when employees can use sick leave under local law or an employer's written policy isn't always simple, as one teacher recently learned.

How you doin'?

Margaret Dynak worked as a full-time teacher for the Wood Dale School District 7 Board of Education. The Illinois School Code allowed her to accrue paid sick leave each school year. By the end of the 2015-2016 school year, she had 71 sick days available to use during that school year. On March 15, 2016, she told school district superintendent Dr. John Corbett she was scheduled to have a baby by cesarean section on June 6, 2016. June 6 was the last full day, and June 7 was the last half-day of the school year.

Dynak told Corbett she intended to use 1.5 days of paid sick leave for June 6 and 7. She also said she intended to take 12 weeks of leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA), starting at the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year. She indicated that she planned to take the first 28.5 days of FMLA leave as paid sick leave.