Employee Benefits

Sick Leave Benefits

Sick leave is one type of paid leave that the University grants to eligible employees. See vacation and holidays for a summary of paid leave benefits other than sick leave.

Sick leave is an extremely valuable benefit for all employees. Please review a slide show about the benefits of accumulated sick leave:

Sick Leave - A Valuable Benefit for All Employees (PDF or PowerPoint)

Sick Leave Provisions that Apply to All Employees Who Earn Sick Leave

  • Sick leave can be used when you cannot be present during your official work schedule due to medical appointments; your own illness or injury or that of a family member that requires your care; or after the death of a family member.

  • In order to be eligible to earn sick leave, you must be in an eligible classified (permanent or project) or unclassified (faculty, academic staff, limited) position and be expected to work for at least one year in a position that is at least one-third of what is considered a full-time appointment.

  • Sick leave may only be taken after it has been earned.

  • Sick leave will be prorated if employed on a part-time basis.

  • Unused sick leave accumulates from year to year without limit (restrictions may apply for unclassified employees).

  • The federal or Wisconsin Family and Medical Leave Act may allow use of sick leave for purposes other than those listed above.

  • If you are laid off, you may use your sick leave credits to pay for State Group Health Insurance for up to five years (restrictions may apply). For more information, go to UWSA's layoff page.

  • Your unused sick leave balance is lost if you terminate employment before retirement unless you have at least 20 years of state WRS creditable service. However, your sick leave balance will be restored if you return to a position that earns sick leave within the reinstatement period (three years for unclassified employees and five years for classified employees).

  • You may convert your sick leave credits at retirement to help pay your State Group Health Insurance premium in retirement. For more information, read a summary of the Sick Leave Conversion Credit program or view the Department of Employee Trust Funds brochure Sick Leave Conversion Credit Program. These provisions also apply to employees who terminate employment have at least 20 years of state WRS creditable service who do not retire at termination.

Additional Sick Leave Provisions for Unclassified Employees (faculty, academic staff, limited)

Unclassified employees should review An Overview of Unclassified Leave Reporting (PDF or PowerPoint).

  • Amount of Sick Leave Accrued
    • New full-time employees with an appointment of at least nine months are granted 22 days (176 hours) of sick leave that is available for use during the first 18 months of employment (initial entitlement).
    • After 18 months, sick leave is earned at the rate of one day per month (for 12 month employees) or 6 days per semester (academic year/9 month employees). This equals 96 hours of sick leave that is earned each fiscal year.
    • Sick leave is prorated is appointment is less than 100%

  • Employees must provide a written certification from a health care provider if sick leave is used for absences in excess of 5 days unless the leave was approved in advance under the provisions of the Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA).

  • If an unclassified employee does not submit all leave reports for a fiscal year, the employee's sick leave balance will be reduced. For additional information about why sick leave will be reduced if there are missing leave reports, please see the Leave Reporting Fact Sheet and a document outlining the 40 Hour Work Week Rationale.

  • Sick leave rules for unclassified employees (faculty, academic staff, limited) are outlined in UWS 19, Wis. Admin. Code and UW System Unclassified Personnel Guideline (UPG) #10 and its attachments.

Note: 1997 Wisconsin Act 237 amended the compensation plan for University of Wisconsin System senior executives. Following the Act, senior executive leave benefit entitlements became regulated by the rules of the Board of Regents in the same manner as provided for faculty and academic staff under Unclassified Personnel Guidelines #9 and #10 and UWS 19, Wis. Admin. Code. Senior executives earn the same amount of sick leave as other twelve-month academic staff.

Additional Sick Leave Provisions for Classified Employees (permanent and project)

  • Amount of Sick Leave Accrued
    • Sick leave is accrued at the rate of .0625 hour for each hour in pay status.
    • A full-time employee accumulates five hours of sick leave for every two-week pay period (130 hours or 16.25 days per year).
    • If an employee is in pay status for less than 76 hours per biweekly period, sick leave will be pro-rated.

  • Limited Term Employees (LTEs) are not eligible to accrue sick leave. Project employees are only eligible to accrue sick leave if covered by the Wisconsin Retirement System (WRS).

  • Leave rules for classified employees are outlined in ER 18, Wis. Admin. Code.

Employer Resources

 

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This document was last revised on October 11, 2012

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