Not qualified for a job? No problem! Just sue(?)

[Gravekeeper]

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/...-teaching-post

FFS people.

Applies for a job that requires speaking Spanish when she can't speak Spanish. Obviously doesn't get job. Sues school for racial discrimination against white people.

The level of entitlement here. I don't even. Applying for a job you aren't qualified for and suggesting that they just get someone else to do the parts you don't know how to do? Then suing for racial discrimination when said employer obviously says no?

[s_stabeler]

[QUOTE=Gravekeeper;165899]they just get someone else to do the parts you don't know how to do? /QUOTE]

like the entire job?

oh, and incidentally, even if this was discrimination- it isn't- this would fall under "bona fide operational requirement" similar to how movies can insist on a white actor for a white character.

[Hyena Dandy]

To be clear, it's not discrimination BECAUSE it's a bona-fide occupational requirement. Not it's not discrimination and ALSO a bona-fide occupational requirement.

[s_stabeler]

yes and no.
1) it isn't illegal discrimination to discriminate on ability to speak a language ( with one caveat. If the language restriction is merely a proxy for discrimination on illegal grounds, it is as if you were discriminating on those illegal grounds)
2) if it was illegal to discriminate on ability to speak a language, it would be legal in this case due to it being a bona fide occupational requirement. ( basically, where discrimination is necessary by the nature of the job itself, it's not illegal. ( so, for example, an actor can be required to be the same race as the character they are playing, since blackface has been seen as insulting for years, and I'm not even sure you can use makeup to make a black person look as if they aren't.) It's similar to why disability laws specify only reasonable accommodations- the larger the changes required, the more likely it is for it to be ruled unreasonable. ( for instance, requiring a handicapped ramp be installed to allow you to get to the ground floor of a building is reasonable. If the office is a cube farm, however, and the paths to get to your cube are too narrow for a wheelchair, it would be unreasonable to demand the office be redesigned to widen the pathways. ( the reason why that is unreasonable is because it would cause major disruption and expense- an office redesign is neither cheap, or quick.)

[TheHuckster]

If the office is a cube farm, however, and the paths to get to your cube are too narrow for a wheelchair, it would be unreasonable to demand the office be redesigned to widen the pathways. ( the reason why that is unreasonable is because it would cause major disruption and expense- an office redesign is neither cheap, or quick.)

Meeeh... The ADA's been here for, what, 25 years now? In fact I think the DNC just celebrated an anniversary. Unless you have a cube farm from the 1980s that hasn't gone through any renovations, I don't see that as being a worthy excuse.

If it's a historic building where you really can't easily add accommodations for wheelchairs, I can understand that. But, really, nowadays you just need to design a modern cube farm for wheelchairs. I'm not sure if there are official guidelines or not, but it's kind of weak to design an office without keeping wheelchairs in mind, and then when a disabled person applies for the job, what you did was somehow excusable.

I mean, heck, even your current workforce could have a temporary (or even permanent) disability from an accident or illness. It's be awful to have to lay them off or force them to quit just because you didn't think about that.

[s_stabeler]

it was supposed to be an example of an unreasonable accommodation- that they would have to redesign the entire office purely so that the disabled person could work there. To use a slightly more likely example, what if the office can only be accessed via stairs? ( yes, it does still occur- I used to work in an office where it required descending a short staircase to access my office, and there was basically no room for a lift)

also, it's worth noting that what is a reasonable accommodation depends on the job- for instance, the job I was doing in that office accessible only by stairs could be done via telecommuting, so a reasonable accommodation for an employee who needed a wheelchair would be to allow telecommuting instead of coming into the office. ( indeed, we had one employee who lived too far away to come into the office, so he telecommuted instead) so adjustments to an office that would be reasonable in say, a call center would be unreasonable where telecommuting was a viable alternative.

[TheHuckster]

I get that. I think a multi-level office building without an elevator is a good example (although, again, only if the building were built before ADA was really a thing; if someone built a multi-level office building today without an elevator, that's a serious oversight). I just didn't think the narrow cube farm was a good example.

[s_stabeler]

I live in the UK, so the relevant law is the Disability Discrimination Act, but yeah, the office was ancient.

and yeah it was a poor example, though not necessarily- even in the cube farm example, it wouldn't be a reasonable accommodation to demand the office redesign. If the office was being redesigned anyway then demanding the new layout allow for wheelchairs is reasonable.

The main point I was trying to make, though, is that in some cases, what would be illegal discrimination elsewhere can be legal, so the teacher in the OP was particularly moronic.(especially when her proposed solution was functionally that they hire another teacher to do the job for her)

[HYHYBT]

The railroad museum has a good example. They put a ramp at the end of the platform, so people who can't climb steep stairs can still board the train. But the newest of their passenger cars is still 60+ years old, with the narrow doors and corridors and tiny bathrooms that entails, so no wheelchairs.