NORTH PLAINFIELD, N.J. (AP) - A New Jersey school district has paid a former employee $35,000 to settle claims it engaged in disability-based discrimination by firing her for “job abandonment” after she missed the last three weeks of a school year due to gallbladder surgery.
North Plainfield also must update its policies and procedures concerning medical leave requests under the agreement announced Monday by the state attorney general’s office. The district also must provide training on those updated items for all supervisors, managers and employees who receive such requests.
State officials say the woman was hired in 2000 to work part-time as a paraprofessional and had no attendance issues until she became ill during the 2013-14 school year. She had provided the district with written medical authorization for her extended absence.
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