School Visitation Rights Act

In 1993, the Illinois General Assembly passed the School Visitation Rights Act (820ILCS147). The law says that parents, step-parents, legal guardians or foster parents who need time off work to visit their children’s schools for parent-teacher conferences or other school activities have a right to that time off. Here are the main features of the act:

• To qualify for time off work to visit your child’s school, you must have been employed by your current employer for at least six months and you must work at least halftime. (Halftime means half of the full-time work week as it is defined at your place of employment.)
• All employers that employ a work force of 50 or more persons in Illinois must obey this law. This includes both public and private employers, but excludes the federal government.
• The school you intend to visit must be a primary or secondary school, or educational facility located in Illinois, or in a state which borders Illinois.
• You are entitled to up to eight hours time off during a school year to visit your child’s school, but you are entitled to no more than four hours off on any one day.
• You can not ask for time off under the provisions of this law unless you have used up all your vacation days, personal leave, compensatory leave or any other leave time you may have available. (Sick and / or disability leave is excluded; you do not have to use sick or disability days to visit your child’s school.)
• Your employer is not required to pay you for the leave time you use to visit your child’s school.
• You can not be required to make up the time you take off to visit your child’s school. If you do make up the time, you shall be paid at your normal rate of pay (not overtime).
• You must ask for the time off guaranteed by this law seven days in advance of needing the time. In case of emergency, no more than 24 hours notice can be required.
• If you must take time off from work as provided by this law, you must show your employer a letter from your child’s principal, verifying that you visited your child’s school for a conference or activity within two working days of the school visitation. These letters will be available in the principal’s office on conference days.
• You must consult with your employer to schedule this leave so as not to unduly disrupt the operation of your employer.