Labor Department Fact Sheet Addresses Questions About Campus Overtime Pay
April 18, 2018

​The Department of Labor (DOL) last week issued a fact sheet on "Higher Education Institutions and Overtime Pay Under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA)" to clarify some key issues about exemptions to federal overtime pay requirements for campus employment.

The fact sheet addresses several lingering questions colleges and universities may have encountered when preparing to comply with the DOL’s final rule on overtime pay issued by the Obama administration in 2015 but struck down by a federal district court in November 2016, as well as questions that have persisted since. The district court ruling was a last-minute development on an issue for which many campuses had been preparing throughout 2016. 

Among the questions the fact sheet answers is the applicability of the teaching exemption to faculty members who teach online or remotely. It also clarifies the specific regulatory provisions for the special exemption provided to “academic administrative personnel.”

ACE joined 20 other higher education associations—led by CUPA-HR—in filing comments with recommendations in response to a July 2017 Request for Information issued by the DOL to begin the process of writing a new overtime rule.

The administration’s projected date​ to issue a proposed rule is October 2018.