Cover story: SUNY does not have ‘uniform’ leave policy

Sylvia Paul knew she needed to be at her father’s side when he had surgery last May. But, like many other UUP members, she never realized she wasn’t covered by a uniform family leave policy until she needed one.

Paul is the director of institutional effectiveness and planning at the Rochester Educational Opportunity Center, which is affiliated with SUNY Brockport. She wanted 10 days of family leave to travel to Orlando, Fla., to help her 80-year-old father — who lives alone — after cataract surgery.

“If there was a policy, it was vague, and nobody had anything written,” Paul said. “Nobody could produce anything that said, ‘This is what you do, one, two, three.’”

Co-workers told Paul that all she had to do was inform her immediate supervisor that she would be using sick time for an emergency leave. Her supervisor, however, told her she had to get a form from the human resources department and have her father’s doctor fill it out, effectively asking him to confirm that indeed she had used her sick time for a family emergency.

“When I talked to other people, not only had they never done this, but they had never heard of it,” Paul said.

Once Paul obtained the form from the human resources department, she was on her way. She spent the 10 days with her father and returned to her job. But a uniform written policy would make a stressful time easier, she said.

“I got the impression even from my director that there was a vague policy,” Paul said. “The fact still remains that I have not seen a written policy yet. And if you don’t have any direction, how are you supposed to know?”

— Darryl McGrath