Girls, I am a Leave/Disability Specialist for Human Resources in a large school district in North Carolina... since we single handedly populate 3 kindergarten classes per year with babies from our employees
, I can tell you what I do for our teachers..While many school districts in other states will provide paid maternity leave (as well as corporate america)..we do not, and that's the hardest thing to get some of our employees who come from out of state to understand. Here are my suggestions, and your specialists may have already covered the points with you...but if not..
1. I don't know where you teach, but... it's not something the admin passes around as free knowledge (don't ask me why)..but there are 20 extended sick leave days gifted to classroom teachers each year. (at a cost of 50.00 per day taken away from their daily breakdown). This is basically only used when a teacher has exhausted all of their other accrued leave balances.....but in your case, with only 5 weeks of paid leave, and if they do not offer voluntary shared leave (where co-workers or relatives can donate leave to you since you need it), then you could use it for the remainder of your medically certified leave (ie what the doctor's note outlines).
2. You need to make sure thru HR that you are not required to remain out of work for a certain period of time.. with us 5 weeks doesn't cut it. We give a standard 6 weeks for vaginal delivery and 8 weeks for c-section. Many times though, doctors will write the employees out for the full 12 weeks of FMLA since being a new mommy is tough stuff
You're no longer just you..you're all of a sudden "baby's mommy"..so the doctors indulge the employees a bit.
We require a return to work or fit for duty note from a doctor if the employee returns to work before the standard 6 or 8 weeks is up...
3. I suggest to all of you... even if you don't have it now, and expect to have another baby after the ones you are carrying...invest in Supplemental Disability Insurance thru whoever your supplemental insurance carrier is (ours is Colonial). This alone is WELL worth it's monthly cost for you. Alot of my maternity employees "double dip" so to speak with this..or use it to cover their leave when they have no accrued leave to keep them on payroll. It will pay up to half of your regular monthly salary for 3 months (many of my employees will get a doctors note for 12 weeks and voila! ... instant check for 3 months!)... It's definitely something you want to have on hand if you can afford it. I have it for the "if I ever get there" maternity leave.. I carry it along with the medical bridge and hospitalization policy that you can get with it. Basically, it will pay me and automatically cover baby if we have to spend a night or more in the hospital after delivery.
4. ASK your benefits specialist.. trust me, they are there for a reason.. and if they won't come off any pertinent information...call a neighboring school district, pretty much, leave policies will run the same county to county. Definitely get a copy of the maternity leave policy if nothing else.
5. Don't know if you've thought of it or not, but if there are a certain amount of days required by your state licensure authority that you must be present, chalk in hand, in the classroom in order for you to get credit for the year (for both your license and for pay experience), make certain you've met the dates before taking an extended leave. I was amazed at how many of my teachers did not know they had to be in the classroom 120 days or more (NC policy..and 120 out of 257 possible days is not expecting too much i don't think lol) in order to get credit. I had a mess to clean up when I took my job 2 years ago...because they'd never been made aware of that. Just make sure you're aware of it...and if you and DH decide that's important to you (some don't care..they just want all the baby time they can get
and that's ok too!
)
It's normal to feel that way... at least from my standpoint, because many of my new moms stay out for an extended period and don't even come back for the remainder of the school year...especially if they give birth so close to the end of the school year. I'm not saying I'm a know it all...by far, but.. I have seen enough of our new teachers come in and tell me that they came from a neighboring school district or another state, and their Leave Specialist didn't explain any of this to them in any great detail. So...just wanting to give you some idea if you didn't already have it
maternity leave
Is this normal to feel is way or am I just super hormonal?????
10/8 165, 12/4 140
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