Good morning County! Happy Tuesday!
I hope you all had a restful long week end, and had an opportunity to perhaps attend some of the events for this year’s heritage day which commemorated Africville.
I heard from a number of you on Friday that you had been contacted by the health and abilities team under the new attendance support program (ASP) about your absences up to and including November 12th of 2019.
Now, I want to make a few things completely clear.
- Nothing in the ASP over rides your right to access sick leave as per your collective agreement.
- Nothing in the ASP requires you to provide any sort of special documentation to the employer about your individual circumstances. If you receive a request for that information outside of the parameters of the agreement (5 consecutive days or a pattern of illness), please contact me.
- The ASP is a voluntary program, which you may access as you see fit.
If you have received one of these e-mails, I would suggest a number of actions.
- If you feel you want to access the programs, (or want to find out what type of services are available), request that information from the team. We have been told that they have access to a wide variety of services which you may find very useful.
- If you feel that you do not need to access the service at this time, feel free to respond in kind. Again, participation in the program is voluntary. A simple “Thanks for your concern, I do not wish to access these services at this time” will suffice.
- Finally make sure that the number of days that the employer says you have missed and your actual leave days match up. You may also want to make sure that the days have been coded properly. It is not unprecedented for a day taken, for example, under our “serious family illness” article to be mis-coded as a sick day. If your records do not match with the e-mail you received, you can request clarification from health and abilities.
Again, this policy DOES NOT affect the number of, nor the way in which, you access your contractual sick time. If you have any further questions, let me know.
Just a few other informational items. I want to thank everyone who nominated someone for our “Awesome Substitute” award. I finished up all the cards last week and put them in the mail, so if you did put someone’s name forward they will be receiving a small thank you. Keep an eye on the school mail.
If there is someone else in your building who you feel deserves a nod of thanks, there are a few ways you can do that. Check out our short-snappers page for information about our Inspire Awards and the Local Service Award.
Finally, we have had to temporarily postpone the social outreach in Porters lake. We will advise as soon as we have re-set that date.
That’s it for this week County. Reach out if you have any questions or concerns.