Temporary Sick Policies for Staff

In responding to the special challenges posed by the H1N1 pandemic, the university's highest priority has been to protect the health and safety of the Tufts community.

We recognize that it is essential that we provide appropriate accommodations to allow those of you who may come down with the flu to stay home while you recover. This will speed your recovery and help prevent the further spread of the virus at Tufts. We also recognize that you may face unanticipated calls on your time to care for ill family members.

Accordingly, effectively immediately we are implementing temporary modifications to some of the university's usual human resources policies for staff, including those regarding sick leave. These special measures are designed to provide additional flexibility if you or members of your families become ill. They apply to all benefits-eligible staff.

If you are a staff member and do not currently have a balance of available sick days, you will be able to borrow up to five sick days from your future accumulation if you come down with the flu. You will also be able to borrow up to five sick days from your future accumulation to use to care for ill family members.

If you are a member of the staff and currently have a balance of available sick days but have exhausted the usual allowance of 10 sick days for care of family members, you will be able to use another five personal sick days from your balance while caring for family members with the flu.

In either case, if you need to stay home because your child's school is closed due to an outbreak of influenza, you can use your illness-in-family days even if your own child is not ill with the flu.

These policies will continue in effect until further notice. A detailed description of them, as well as related temporary changes to the medical leave policy and guidelines on working from home, is available on the Human Resources website at http://hr.tufts.edu/flu. Supervisors or staff with questions about them should contact their HR representatives. Since time off policies for faculty vary from school to school, faculty with any questions about their own use of sick time are encouraged to contact their department chair or school dean's office.

More information about how Tufts is responding to H1N1 is available online at http://emergency.tufts.edu/flu. We hope that these enhanced sick-leave policies will make it easier for you and your families to stay healthy for the duration of this pandemic.