People are worried about the abuse of paid sick days. Let me tell you as a teacher with 11 paid sick days:

1. Not everyone will take their full allotment of sick days.
2. It'll take a lot more than paid sick days to change our toxic work culture.

Let me explain.

Why are schools a cesspool of germs? It's simple:

Everyone goes to school sick.

Not only is it more work to take a sick day, we disapprove of teachers taking them. From our politicians to punitive attendance policies, we send the msg that you're better off going to work sick.

So teachers drag their sick butts to school. We role model to students that a hard worker is one that comes to work sick. We think positively of the sick teacher in the classroom & cast suspicion on anyone who takes a sick day.

How sick are they?

Are they REALLY sick?

When children get sick, parents send them to school anyway. As they get older, they go to school even when they shouldn't.

I once had a student tell me they got hit by a car and instead of worrying about their own well-being, they got up and ran to school to hand in their essay.

When asked why they would even do that, they replied, "but I have to hand in my essay. It was due."

No.

If you ever get hit by a car, go take care of yourself. Your boss, teacher, employer, whatever can wait.

I cannot believe I had to explain that to an 18 year old.

This is the kind of toxic workplace practices we have encouraged. We have raised generations of people to place work above their health.

And now here we are with a global pandemic.

Why are we having such a difficult time reopening schools?

Because we all know the truth: y'all are going to come in sick and we're going to play hot potato with COVID-19.

The only time I've never been sick was when I was on leave for a year.

Paid sick days are a good start. But it needs to be paired with a shift in workplace culture.

We need to start encouraging people to place health above work. If you are sick, stay home. Don't wait until you're half-dead from whatever it is you have.

We need to stop guilting people for being sick or assuming they're lazy.

But if we can't do that, then hey...paid sick days are a great start.

Nobody should be forced to come to work sick and not only prolong their illness, but infect everyone else.

Healthy workers are more productive and happier workers.