Make Paid Family Leave Not Suck: Policy Summit Recap

By Binta Beard and Becky Michelson

What happens when leaders come together from across the country in a forum that centers equity and design thinking with the shared goal of ensuring families and workers in the US have access to equitable paid family and medical leave? This was the central question at the Make Family Leave Not Suck Policy Summit on April 27–29 at the MIT Media Lab, which was supported by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation. We convened 60–70 experts in diverse fields to engage in dynamic and collaborative discussions sharing strategies and best practices for advancing equitable paid leave across the country and workplaces. The plurality of voices contributed to rich conversations, with leadership representation from maternal and child health, community organizing, public policy, the private sector, and architects of paid leave policies.

The Make Family Leave Not Suck Policy Summit convened leaders in maternal and child health, community organizing, public policy, the private sector, and architects of paid leave policies at the MIT Media Lab in April 2018.

The US is one of a handful of countries in the world without paid maternity leave. Papua New Guinea and some island nations of Micronesia are the only others. Consequently, economic pressure to keep a roof over their heads forces new parents to return to work before they have recovered from childbirth and denies them the opportunity to provide the best care for their newborn. One study found that around 25 percent of women in the U.S. return to work within 10 days of delivery. Despite the economic and public health benefits of paid leave, only 14 percent of US workers have access to paid leave. Those without access to any leave policy are disproportionately black, brown, low-wage workers, and from diverse family structures.

Equitable Paid Leave

The Make Family Leave Not Suck Policy Summit aimed to bolster efforts to equitable paid leave. That means job-protected leave with adequate time off, wage replacement that allows low-wage workers to take leave, broad employee eligibility criteria, and a gender-neutral, expansive definition of family. The policy summit was rooted in embodying equity throughout the process and centered traditionally marginalized voices of low-wage workers, varied geographies, and parents of color. These groups are leading on creative policy solutions, but are often excluded from forums developing solutions to problems that disproportionately impact their communities. With that in mind, the first day of the policy summit kicked off with an Equity X Design training created by Jennifer Roberts, CEO of Versed Education Group. Equity X Design is a framework created by the Equity Lab (https://www.theequitylab.org/) that focuses on creating just and equitable products and policies from the beginning. Participants discussed how the policy process can include marginalized voices, share power, and unpack the ways that relationships within ecosystems can be oppressive.

Participants were introduced to the Equity X Design framework to guide conversations about equitable policies. Read about the principles in the article “Racism and inequity are products of design. They can be redesigned.”

Following the equity workshop, the policy summit featured interactive panel discussions with activists, thought leaders, and policymakers sharing strategies for building more equitable paid leave policies and practices in policy and workplaces. These insightful conversations capture the exciting moment in time as more workplaces, state and local governments pass paid leave laws. As of 2018, 7 states have passed PFML laws with Massachusetts recently passing the most generous policy thus far. Authors of paid leave laws and seasoned community organizers committed to empowering traditionally marginalized communities of color and low-wage workers discussed overcoming obstacles to achieving equitable paid leave and keys for successfully expanding access. The day concluded with a screening of Zero Weeks, a documentary about how there are zero weeks of paid family leave in the United States. This was followed by a conversation with Director Ky Dickens and leaders in paid family leave, including Nicole Rodriguez (Community Labor United) and Adriana Logalbo of 1,000 Days.

Backcasting to Get to the Future

The second day of the policy summit incorporated features of design thinking and hackathons, with participants rolling up their sleeves to envision how to achieve equitable paid family leave in the US. This session was facilitated by the innovation design firm, Continuum with support from Deborah Barron of ChangeLab Solutions. They led an exercise in “back-casting” a technique where designers outline pathways for achieving goals based on different stakeholders. The working groups emerged with proposals for dismantling barriers to advocacy, building bridges among partners in a fragmented ecosystem, engaging with policymakers, and increasing eligibility for all workers. This session was successful in part because the groups were curated with people from different backgrounds and expertise, so that everyone was learning from each other. The interactivity of the session also sparked candid conversations regarding issues, such as inequities in philanthropy, challenges to successful partnership among organizations engaged in family leave, and strategies for advancing paid leave in diverse geographies and cultural contexts.

A central pillar to the policy summit and the Make the Breast Pump Not Suck Hackathon is the powerful and transformative impact of personal narratives. During one of these “equity pauses,” Clarissa Doutherd (Executive Director of Parent Voices Oakland) shared how her experience years ago as a new mom without paid leave motivates her as a community organizer to empower parents to advocate for economic and educational justice. As advocates for paid family and medical leave, it is our job to ensure that diverse lived experiences are driving equitable policies.

Right to left: Interview with Clarissa Doutherd of Parent Voices Oakland and Quotes on a Wall from the Speaking Our Truths: 27 Stories of What’s It’s Really Like to Breastfeed and Pump in the United States.

Want to know what you can do?

There are many ways that you can make a difference for equitable paid family leave in your state and beyond.

• Check out Paid Family and Medical Leave resources by MomsRising, ChangeLab Solutions, A Better Balance, and Family Values @ Work.
• National Partnership For Women’s Families has toolkits, interactive maps, infographics and more to stay updated on the latest information.
• Sign up to stay updated on the OUR Walmart campaign
• Participate in Black Women’s Breastfeeding Week happening from August 25th-31st.
• Screen Zero Weeks — the documentary about paid family and medical leave in the United States, Zero Weeks–, in your community
• Become a Mamavist with the group Mothering Justice
• Read the book The Big Letdown: How Medicine, Big Business, and Feminism Undermine Breastfeeding by Kimberly Seals-Allers.

Stay Connected with Make the Breast Pump Not Suck

• Follow us on Twitter and the hashtag #breastfeedinginnovation
• Join the Make the Breast Pump Not Suck Facebook group and introduce yourself: who you are, what you do, and why you’re joining.