With the back-to-school season quickly approaching, school boards are issuing a choice to parents; you can choose to send your children to school for day class, homeschool them or have them opt for online learning. And while attendance for students may be voluntary, it appears as though a parent’s legal options may be limited should their employer choose to call them back to work.
Howard Levitt is a senior partner with Levitt LLP. Speaking with 570NEWS, Levitt breaks down the legal rights of a parent who may be looking to take time to teach their own children or opt to help them with their online learning rather than heading to work.
“Parents who are working have no such choice…” says Levitt. “If your employer wants you to come back to work and the school is open for children to attend – you must have the children attend. If you want to stay home in those circumstances the employer can fire you for cause for abandonment.”
According to Levitt if schools aren’t open, such as in the case of an extended outbreak – parents will need to prove that there are no options other than for them to be at home caring for their child. Should those circumstances be met, parents have a right to stay home without risk of discharge from their job.
“If you can productively do your work at home with your child there (…) assuming you’re in one of those few positions where you can do that and productively fill out a day, the employer has to accommodate that legally through human rights legislation and pay you your salary while you’re at home.”
Levitt does caution, however, that should an employer be set on having a parent return to work they have the legal right to find a daycare or school for their employee’s child within a reasonable distance from the workplace or home.
“If the employer finds a daycare or school that the child can attend the parent does not have a choice (…) they have to go to work. Fundamentally, it’s the employee’s obligation and the employer’s right to require parents to work”.
In the case of schools being open for a limited number of days per week, Levitt says that employers must accommodate that for employees – potentially for years – until school returns a full week schedule or until children are old enough to not need to attend school.
Levitt says he understands that some parents have concerns about sending their child to school for a variety of reasons – whether it be concerns about them getting a proper education, exposure to the virus
“A lot of parents are worried about their children going to school.” Says Levitt. “They’re worried about not getting a proper education right now (…) they have many other reasons why they don’t want to send their children back into the universe (…) I understand all that, and all that is fair.”
“But… if the child is able to go to school everyday, the parent cannot legally refuse to go to work because they prefer to homeschool or at least to help their child do remote learning. They don’t have that legal option (…) if they insist on staying home, they can be fired for cause. That’s the law.”
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August 23, 2020 at 03:11AM
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Return-to-school likely to mean return to work for parents - KitchenerToday.com
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