If you've got kids, you may have gotten the call to come to the school immediately because your child forgot to wear a belt, or lost his asthma inhaler, or argued with his teacher. For some hourly employees, making a quick trip to their kid's school could cost them their job.
But a bill awaiting Gov. J.B. Pritzker's signature would provide protection for workers who need to attend a parent-teacher conference or any other important meeting at their child’s school.
State Rep.Anne Stava-Murray (Naperville-D), sponsored the legislation.
"There's many teachers, or former teachers, or parents who have reached out to me saying that fear of job loss is one of the major reasons why they're not able to attend important school meetings," she says.
She filed the proposal after she found a similar law in another state, and discovered her constituents wanted this protection.
"In my district, this was overwhelmingly the most popular bill that I personally worked on, and people were quite shocked that anyone even voted against this,” she says. “They were looking up the names of the legislators who voted against it, and they were like why would anyone?"
Employers won't have to pay workers for the time they're gone, but can't use such absences as a reason to fire the employee.
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