Adoption and FMLA

[mhennigan1377]

What is the name of your state (only U.S. law)? New York, Erie County

My wife and I are adopting from Colombia and this requires us to be out of country for 6-8 weeks.

My wife is a teacher and under her contract if she was giving birth, this would constitute a medical event which she could "go on disability" and use up her sick time (8 weeks paid).

Now because this is an adoption and she won't technically have any medical issues the rule doesn't apply to us. Under FMLA though she can take up to 12 weeks and as long as we pay, we can keep her insurance.

I've been trying to research about whether there is anyway to use her sick time. The only thing I've been able to find is we could use up to two weeks paid if the child was sick.

Someone from her union told us to check the Wage Determination Online site (Wage Determination Online Homepage) but didn't give us any more information and I'm not quite sure what I'd be looking for.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks!

 

[cbg]

FMLA is by definition unpaid. She can request or her employer can require that she use any vacation time she has available, but I am not aware of any state or Federal law that requires an employer to allow her to use sick time when no one is sick. Unless her union contract expressly grants her this right, as far as I know this is going to be entirely up to her employer.

If I am wrong, I'm sure someone will correct me. YAG? This is your state, is it not?