Leave Laws for School-Related Activities

The time is here for all of the kiddos and teens to return to school. Just when you sigh a breath of relief, you remember all of the events and school meetings that your employees will need to attend over the next 9-12 months. Let us help by refreshing you on your responsibilities for permitting employees to take time off work for school related activities. Here we will provide you with the information you need.

The Family School Partnership Act was passed and signed in 1995 for the purpose of ensuring that working parents could take time off work to attend to their child(ren)s school needs without the fear of losing their jobs. California has separated the employer's requirement to provide time off into two categories: School Suspensions & School Activities.

School Suspensions 

An employee who is the parent or guardian of a child can take unpaid time off when the parent must leave work and attend the child's school due to their suspension or expulsion. The employer may request documentation from the child's school to support the need for the employee's time off. This section applies to all California employers regardless of the size of the organization.

School Activities

This section applies to employers with 25 or more employees. An employee who is the parent or guardian of a child can take unpaid time-off to find or enroll a child in a school/licensed childcare program, to participate in school/licensed childcare related activities, or due to an emergency situation occurring at the school. Employees are limited to taking off a maximum of 40 hours per year and no more than 8 hours per month. Examples may include:

• Parent/teacher meetings;
• School activities such as graduation, field trip, awards ceremonies, etc.;
• Attend school to meet about a disciplinary issue;
• School emergency situation at the school.

In these examples, the employee must give their employer as much reasonable notice as possible. The employer may request documentation from the child's school to support the need for the employee's time off. Finally, the time off in all cases is unpaid; however, the employer may allow or require the employee to use any accrued Vacation or PTO time that is available.

Employee Eligibility

Employees who are eligible to request this time off include: parents, guardians, stepparents, foster parents, grandparents, or a person who stands in place of the child’s parent.

To see CEA's informational guide for all required leaves in California, including School Activities, refer to our California Leave Laws Guide on our HR Forms Page.