Assessing Maternity/Family Leave on Interview Trail

[chickenliz]

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Hi everyone! I'm wondering if anyone has come across advice or a plan for assessing maternity leave policies and options while on the interview trail. I am a woman going into neurology. Is it appropriate to ask residents at the interview dinner? I know I can't be discriminated against for wanting to have a child during residency but whose to say my interest won't prevent programs from ranking me lower... Anyone else in the same boat or have recommendations?

 

[eternelle]

Personally, I wouldn’t explicitly ask about maternity leave policies. You can get a good sense of this by asking how many residents at the program have significant others and families. A lot of the time when you ask that, they’ll tell you that so-and-so just had a baby and it opens the door to more questions. The super family friendly programs tend to be upfront about it.

 

[differentiating]

I agree that the programs that are really family-friendly tend to be very forthcoming- one program I interviewed at joked about how many of their female residents & faculty had had babies lately and how they were running out of creative ideas for showers as part of their “resident life” talk. I wouldn’t bring it up unprompted, though, since you bringing it up makes it fair game for them to ask about if I understand the rules correctly.

 

[Angus Avagadro]

I think asking about maternity/paternity policies is ok. Telling them you are planning to start your family during residencey interview is not so wise. Someone will have to cover your call and clinic while you are on leave. There could be a soft bias toward you.

 

[deleted480308]

Leave policy should be in the sample contracts they should show you

 

[chickenliz]

Thanks all!

 

[samac]

I have yet to see a program that offers any kind of maternity/paternity leave. You’d be expected to use your time and you would take unpaid leave past that threshold. Residencies tend to be pretty uniform in that aspect as the funds come from the same pot.
There’s also no way I’d bring up wanting to have kids. I understand they can’t consciously have bias against you, but when it comes rank time I’m sure they’ll have the fact that you plan to be away at some point in the forefront of their mind.

 

[Dr G Oogle]

It’s pretty standard across programs, but can ask residents who had kids in residency of you get sense that the program is reasonable. If it’s unreasonable it’s probably not a place you want to train anyway

 

[Angus Avagadro]

I have yet to see a program that offers any kind of maternity/paternity leave. You’d be expected to use your time and you would take unpaid leave past that threshold. Residencies tend to be pretty uniform in that aspect as the funds come from the same pot.
There’s also no way I’d bring up wanting to have kids. I understand they can’t consciously have bias against you, but when it comes rank time I’m sure they’ll have the fact that you plan to be away at some point in the forefront of their mind.

My wife got 6 weeks. Used 2 weeks vacation and 4 weeks leave