Despite school workforces being dominated by women in their childbearing years, there are uneven resources and benefits for pregnant and postpartum teachers. But more paid leave and other support can be a retention strategy, experts say.
Fewer than a third of states require school districts to offer any paid parental leave for teachers, according to a report by the National Council on Teacher Quality. Instead, many teachers who give birth during the school year use their accumulated sick days to have some paid time off with their newborns, and supplement that with unpaid leave (most teachers qualify for 12 weeks of unpaid, job-protected leave under the Family and Medical Leave Act, as long as they’ve been working at their job for a year).
Arkansas and Delaware are the only states that provide at least 12 weeks of fully paid leave, according to NCTQ. Research shows that longer paid maternity leave is associated with lower rates of postpartum depression, improved mother-child bonding, and better infant health.
Jessica Lee, the co-director of the Center for WorkLife Law, an advocacy and research organization based at the law school of the University of California Hastings, spoke with Education Week about the challenges postpartum teachers face, and what schools can do to help.
“We need to recognize that childbirth is not the end of somebody’s pregnancy journey. It’s not the end of their health needs,” said Lee. “It’s just the beginning of a different set of needs.”
This interview has been edited lightly for length and clarity.
What’s the state of paid leave for teachers who become parents?
There is no national paid leave program, so states across the country have been enacting their own paid leave laws. We also see a lot of teachers’ unions bargaining for paid leave across the country.
Unfortunately, we are still far behind when it comes to providing paid leave to educators. Around half of all states have no paid leave program for their K-12 teachers, and even the ones that do, [the benefits] really vary. For example, some plans are far more generous than others. The length of time varies; the rates depend on where you are; whether you’re in a union and what kind of school you teach in matters, too.
If I’m being blunt, it’s just a mess and a real patchwork that’s leaving a lot of people in difficult situations and contributing to high turnover in the teaching profession.
Does the postpartum period affect teachers differently than the average mother?
Being an educator is not only a lot of work for your brain; it can be work for your body. It’s high stress. The hours are intense for a lot of folks, both with your in-classroom time and planning time.
And on top of it, teachers aren’t getting a lot of leave, and we know that being able to access paid leave for 12 weeks really significantly reduces the rates of postpartum depression.
Teachers are already starting from behind by having a short paid recovery period from birth, and then they’re going into a very high-stress, high-demand workplace. It’s a recipe for disaster for a lot of folks.
Aside from paid leave, what are other ways schools can support pregnant or postpartum teachers?
Schools are required to provide reasonable accommodations when needed for pregnancy, childbirth, recovery, and postpartum conditions. The requirement to do that nationwide is pretty new—it’s just a few years old under a law called the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act.
We see a lot of school systems that are behind in doing that, but when school systems do provide accommodations, it eases some of the burdens for these teachers when they return to work.
It’s simple things like making sure educators have the ability to take doctor’s appointments, providing assistance with some physical tasks if a teacher is in a high-impact classroom with physical demands. Providing an assistant to help them can be really useful, too.
Why do you think it’s taken so long for these changes to happen?
It’s not just educators. It’s everyone. Our whole country is behind.
And then on top of that, I think that a lot of people have this belief that if you’re a teacher, you are expected to make sacrifices and be a superhuman. We call our teachers superheroes, and I think sometimes people forget that they are human. They have families just like everyone else. They have bodies that need care.
But there’s a real culture of undervaluing educators in this country, and I think that what we’re seeing with parental leave is just one example of that.
What are the mental health effects that come with teachers who do not get paid leave?
Burnout is real. Difficulties with lactation are very common when you don’t have enough leave, and then you’re coming back into a place where breaks might not be as readily available.
We see people with postpartum anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder—it really varies. We see ... folks who are right in the middle of their physical recovery taking on that high stress.
The Lindsay Clancy trial has been in the news, and it has people talking about postpartum depression. Is there anything educators can take away from the case?
In general, we need to recognize that childbirth is not the end of somebody’s pregnancy journey. It’s not the end of their health needs. It’s just the beginning of a different set of needs.
There has been a growing movement to talk about what we call the fourth trimester, which is the healing that occurs, the rewiring of someone’s brain that occurs, and the managing of all of the changes that are happening with someone. It’s really healthy to be thinking about that recovery as a much longer process. It’s not just nine months or 40 weeks of pregnancy.
Are there any states or districts that are really moving the needle on this issue?
We’re really excited about California. California was one of the first states to put in place paid pregnancy and paid family leave, but teachers were left out. But thankfully, due to a ton of organizing, California educators are about to get 14 weeks of paid pregnancy disability starting Jan. 27. That’s going to be really, really huge for folks to have. They’ll have access to 14 weeks, which can be taken for their health before or following birth.
I’m hopeful that more states are going to enact broad policies that protect everyone.
