UConn is home to about 1,700 tenured, tenure-track, and non-tenure track faculty on its Storrs and regional campuses. They are responsible for delivering a world-class education to our 34,000-plus students, along with conducting research and producing meaningful scholarship in their fields.

 Based on statements in Monday’s op-ed (“This is UConn: Zero Paid Leave for Professors”), the University wants to ensure that our faculty, elected officials, and other Connecticut residents have accurate, precise information on medical and family leave afforded to faculty, along with their free speech and academic freedom protections.

Specifically, the provisions applicable to faculty are as follows:

• UConn abides by all federal and state laws for its employees, including those providing job-protected family and medical leave, disability accommodations, and paid sick leave.
• Every tenured and tenure-track UConn faculty member is entitled to six months of paid leave for their own qualifying medical condition, with potential for up to 24 months. The same provision applies for CIRE (clinical, in-residence, and extension) faculty with at least three years of UConn employment.
• An employee’s own qualifying medical condition includes the six to eight weeks of recovery following childbirth, and may also apply to other pregnancy-related conditions such as postpartum depression.
• For CIRE faculty not yet eligible for the six-month paid leave, six to eight weeks of paid sick leave is typically granted for the employee’s own medical condition, including post-childbirth recovery. UConn is aware of no cases in which a faculty member or any other employee was expected to return to work only a short duration after giving birth.
• Faculty who experience a major life event – including birth or adoption of a child – can have their duties modified in the semester or year following the event. A faculty member who is a birth/adoptive parent or primary caregiver is eligible for release from on-site duties such as classroom teaching, and would be assigned alternative duties that can be performed more flexibly. A faculty member who is a secondary caregiver may similarly work with their department head to modify their duties.
• To ensure that such instances don’t derail their career path, tenure-track faculty are granted an additional year on their tenure clock if they have taken qualified family and/or medical leave, or experience a qualifying major life event as defined in federal and/or state family and/or medical leave laws.
• These provisions are available whether faculty work on a full-year appointment or the nine-month term, which runs concurrent with the academic year without summer duties.

UConn administrators are covered by other provisions which may, but do not necessarily, provide for full pay during family leave:

• Management and confidential (non-union) employees at UConn receive or accrue paid time off, such as sick, vacation, and personal leave. These leave balances may be used to continue an employee’s pay during a qualifying family or medical leave.
• There are no provisions for modification of work duties for management or confidential employees.
• They are subject to a 0.5% payroll tax to help fund the Connecticut Paid Leave program, and therefore may avail themselves of that program under qualifying circumstances. It provides up to 12 weeks of paid leave benefits, but does not fully replace wages.
• The UConn faculty union, like other state employee unions, could negotiate to have its members participate in the program and be subject to the payroll tax in return for the benefit, but the union has not proposed to do so.

Separately, UConn has been informed through media outlet inquiries, including the Connecticut Mirror, of questions about protection of academic freedom. UConn is deeply committed to academic freedom, seeing it as fundamental to our mission as a public research university.

As such, its importance is enshrined in the current AAUP contract and in the University Bylaws, which provide significant detail on the full freedom to teach, research, publish, and engage in open inquiry and expression, consistent with the 1940 Statement of Principles on Academic Freedom and Tenure.

Prospective students apply to UConn for many reasons, including our vibrant campuses, an outstanding student experience, and the exceptional value we offer Connecticut residents compared to other institutions. But the single most important reason our students want to attend and graduate from UConn is the outstanding education we offer. This is in part why a record-breaking 62,000 people applied to UConn this year.

The key to this is our exceptional faculty, supported by our hard-working staff. Being able to recruit and retain the very best means ensuring that the negotiated pay and benefits we offer are highly competitive and that, at UConn, faculty are guaranteed the academic freedom that is an essential component of their teaching and research.

We are proud that we are able to continue to offer both, supporting our workforce and helping UConn to successfully carry out its mission on behalf of Connecticut.

Stephanie Reitz is the spokesperson and manager of media relations at the University of Connecticut.