What is the Massachusetts Paid Family & Medical Leave Act?

Massachusetts Paid Family and Medical Leave is a law that provides eligible Massachusetts employees with certain paid medical and family leaves.

On January 1, 2021, MIT made changes to its medical and family leave policies in response to the law. 

For background on the law, see below.

What Does the Law Provide?

Medical leave

  • Up to 20 weeks of paid leave per year for an employee’s own serious health condition

Family leave

  • Up to 12 weeks of paid leave per year for the birth, adoption, or foster care placement of a child
  • Up to 12 weeks of paid leave per year to care for a family member with a serious health condition
  • Paid leaves relating to a family member in the armed services (either up to 12 weeks or 26 weeks, depending on the reason for the leave)

An employee may take up to 26 weeks of paid leave (total) per year. The amount of pay is set by a state formula, up to a weekly maximum (details on the state formula rate).

How Did MIT Respond?

See below for an overview of the changes MIT made in 2021 in response to the law.

Leaves

Most of MIT’s current sick and family leave benefits already complied with the PFMLA. We expanded our leave benefits in certain respects where the state law requires longer leave periods or extends paid leave benefits to certain categories of employees who are not currently eligible for our benefits.

Visit the Employee Leaves site to see an overview of the various leave types that are available to employees.

Sick time tracking

MIT must track sick time for all employees to ensure we comply with the law. Sick time is now accrued on a monthly basis for all staff, including salaried staff.

Other changes

To ensure compliance with the state paid leave law and efficient administration of our resulting leave benefits, MIT contracted with Workpartners, a leave administration vendor. Workpartners will work with employees and leave supervisors to ensure that employees are informed of their rights and options for a serious health condition leave, and also to ensure that leave time is properly tracked. See how to request a leave.

Leaves at Lincoln Laboratory will continue to be managed by their HR administrators.

See MIT's PFMLA Plan (MIT login required) for additional PFMLA leave details.

More background on the PFMLA

MIT is committed to providing an environment that is accessible and inclusive for individuals with disabilities. If you need a disability-related accommodation to access the materials below, please email leavepolicies@mit.edu.

Notices

2023 notices

In 2023, the state formula rate will increase to $1,129.82. 

Workplace posters

2023 posters
2022 posters

Technical change in calculating leave time

As a result of this state law, MIT implemented a technical change in the way the leave period under the federal Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) is calculated. MIT is required by law to provide notice of this change.

Details

Under the FMLA, an employee may use 12 weeks of unpaid leave within a year for certain family and medical leaves. The FMLA permits different methods to calculate when an employee reaches that 12 week limit. In determining the 12 week limit, MIT has used a “rolling” method to look backwards at prior FMLA leaves during the past year. As of January 1, 2021, MIT will use a forward looking method to determine the 12 weeks of FMLA eligibility.

"Rolling" method for calculating the FMLA period

Under this method, the "rolling" 12-month period is measured backward from the date of an employee’s first use of FMLA leave for a given qualifying event.

Here is an example:

  • Employee requests to begin an FMLA qualifying leave on March 1, 2021. The employee had used prior FMLA leaves.
  • The look-back period for the request goes back to March 1, 2020.
  • Assume that the employee used 4 weeks of FMLA in April 2020, and 4 weeks in May 2020 for a total of 8 weeks over that 12-month period.
  • As of March 1, 2021, the employee is entitled to 4 weeks of FMLA (12-week entitlement minus the 8 weeks already taken).
  • Because the FMLA period is recalculated using the "rolling" method, an additional 4 weeks of FMLA will become available in May 2021, with another 4 weeks becoming available in June 2021.
Forward-looking method for calculating the FMLA period

Under this method, the 12-month period begins on the first day the employee takes FMLA leave. If FMLA leave is taken after that 12-month period ends, their next 12-month period begins on the first day of that leave.

Here is an example. Assume similar facts as in the prior example:

  • Employee took a 4-week FMLA leave in March 2020, and a 4-week FMLA leave in May 2020.
  • The employee requests an FMLA qualifying leave beginning March 1, 2021.
  • If MIT had been using the  12-month forward-looking method for all of these leaves:
    • The 4-week leave in March 2020 would have been granted, with an end date of February 2021.
    • The 4-week leave in May 2020 for the same leave reason would have been granted with an end date of February 2021.
    • For the March 1, 2021 leave, the employee will get a new 12-week FMLA balance with an end date in February 2022.
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