Avoiding Discrimination Litigation With Teachers With Disabilities: A Litigation Review

Qualified teachers with disabilities are protected by the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). To maintain legal compliance, principals must have an understanding of employment law, but often lack the training to prevent legal liability. This study reviewed litigation on discrimination claims under the ADA and Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. Discrimination claims included failure to accommodate, adverse employment action, wrongful termination, and constructive discharge. Authors analyze results and discuss implications for future research and practice.

Restrictive Covenants: When the Honeymoon Ends

The law governing restrictive covenants in employment agreements has evolved rapidly in recent years and continues to do so. This article provides an in-depth examination of the function of restrictive covenants in the employment context through an evaluation of jurisprudence. The article analyzes various aspects of restrictive covenants, including their enforceability, relationship with the doctrine of severance, interpretation through the functionalist and formalist approaches, and effects on pre-existing employment agreements and wrongful termination. The author concludes by providing recommendations for drafting and implementing restrictive covenants.

A Comment on “Employee Tenure and Economic Losses in Wrongful Termination Cases”

In the April 2013 issue of the Journal of Forensic Economics, Charles L. Baum II develops a model to estimate the annual probability of a worker remaining with a particular employer and applies his results to estimates of economic losses resulting from wrongful termination. Baum's adjustment for job survival is based only on forecast experience in the job held at the time of the termination. This method seems inconsistent with Baum's own findings that early years in any job are associated with much higher hazard rates. In this comment we apply Baum's survival coefficients in a model that incorporates the probability of termination and survival in both the original job and the replacement job.