Another Story

My grad student just got back from a rural school district in which he collected his data and described how the teachers look there right now. 63 of them have received layoff notices, and nobody has slept in weeks.

It made me think about my friends, a teacher / administrative assistant couple. Their story is just another story of the personal effects of the political changes in our state. The husband is a high-school teacher, but he did other things for a number of years too and as a result this is only his second year as a full-time teacher. He has a master's degree. His wife also has a master's degree but hasn't been able to find any work in her area of specialization in this economy, so to make ends meet she took the best job she could find, as an administrative assistant at our university-affiliated hospital. They are expecting their first baby in May.

The husband's union voted to delay sending out layoff notices until May 15 (right around when their baby is due), so he doesn't know whether he'll have a job next year. Given the cuts his district is facing and his lack of seniority, it is pretty likely he'll be laid off. The wife's institution (my institution) doesn't have any maternity leave policy or parental leave policy. So the only thing she has available to her is the family medical leave act, which states that you can use your accumulated sick leave for a maximum of 12 weeks off. She hasn't accumulated that much sick leave, so she will only be able to take 8 weeks off.

She will then have to return to work, even though her salary is so low that it would barely cover childcare expenses. They were hoping to have her stay home for a few years, but now they can't afford to live without her salary due to the cuts in take-home pay they are facing as a result of the budget repair bill. Moreover, if her husband is laid off, she will have to return to work so that they can keep their health insurance, and insure their new baby on her plan. She is matter of fact about this and I keep sadly thinking to myself that theoretically returning to full-time work when your baby is 8 weeks old is very different from having to actually do it.

Of course, people do it all the time, and they do it sometimes when their babies are only 8 days old. Many people don't have options or choices. It's not a new story, of course, and I know my friends will survive. But it is just one of thousands of stories about how people's lives are being radically affected by what's happening here.