Read the text below.
A teacher received a donation of more than 100 sick leaves from his colleagues so he can care for his daughter who has cancer.
David Green is a faculty member of Mae Jemison High School in Huntsville, Alabama. Green has already exhausted all of his sick leaves at work to stay with his one-year-old daughter, Kinsley, at the hospital. His daughter was diagnosed with leukemia, a type of blood cancer, when she was 10 months old. Since then, his daughter has been receiving treatment at a medical facility in Birmingham, a city more than an hour drive from Huntsville.
After Green ran out of sick leaves, his wife posted about the family’s situation on Facebook. Green’s wife pleaded teachers from Alabama to donate their sick leaves to her husband so they can be together as a family during Kinsley’s treatment.
The Facebook post became viral, and a local TV station even featured the Greens’ story. Sick leave donations poured in from teachers and school personnel from all over the state. The Greens expressed gratitude for people’s overwhelming response after getting so much more sick leave donations than what they were expecting.
Donating and borrowing sick leaves is part of a contingency plan among teachers in the state of Alabama. The Huntsville school district has created a sick leave bank that allows school personnel to borrow or donate sick leaves. Members with a catastrophic injury or illness or who have a family member in the said condition can borrow sick leaves from the bank. The sick leaves are paid, so members do not lose compensation during times of illness.