"The Americans With Disabilities Act is
one of the most significant laws in
American
History. The preamble to the law states
that it covers 43,000,000
Americans."(Frierson,
p.3) Before the Americans With Disabilities
Act(A.D.A.)
was passed,
employers were able to deny employment to a disabled worker, simply because he
or she was disabled. With no other
reason other than the persons
physical
disability were they turned away or released from a job. The Americans With Disabilities Act prevented
this type of discrimination by establishing rules and regulations designed to
protect persons with physical disabilities.
With a workforce
made up of
43,000,000 people, it is impossible to ignore the impact of
these people. The Americans With Disabilities Act not only
opened the door for
millions of
Americans to get back into the
workplace, it is paving the road
for new
facilities in the workplace, new training programs and creating
jobs designed for
a disabled society.
I believe the Americans With Disabilities Act
is the most important precedent
set in the
struggle against all discrimination for persons with disability. In
this paper I will
give a brief description of the statutes set by the Americans
With Disabilities
Act, pertaining to disabilities in the workplace. I will
then discuss what
employers are required to do according to the A.D.A. and some
of the
regulations they must abide by. The next
section of this paper will
discuss the
actual training of employees with disabilities with a highlight on
training programs
for workers with mobility and motion disabilities. The
following section
of this paper will discuss the economic effects of a
vocational
rehabilitation program. Finally this
paper will conclude with a
brief discussion
of what the measures set by the Americans With Disabilities
Act means to the
actual workers and people it benefits.
The Americans
With Disabilities Act
The Americans With Disabilities Act has a
section devoted to nothing but
practices by
employers regarding the treatment of applicants and on staff
workers based on
their physical condition or any health problems they may have.
Some of the disabilities included are vision,
hearing, motion, or mental
impairments. "Title I of the Americans With
Disabilities Act prohibits
employers from
discriminating against qualified individuals with disabilities
in job
application procedures, hiring, firing, advancement, compensation, job
training and
other terms and conditions of employment"(The Americans With
Disabilities
Act). According to the Americans With
Disabilities Act, the only
way an employer
can refuse to hire an employee based upon a disability is
if that persons
disability imposes an undue hardship on the operation
of the employer's
business. Then the question arises, what
is considered an
undue
hardship? The Americans With
Disabilities Act states that an undue
hardship is any
action that is considered to be in excessive cost to the
employer, or if
the reforms are too extensive, substantial, disruptive to the
goings on of the
company or anything that would substantially change the
operation of the
business.
In addition to this, the Americans With
Disabilities Act provides some information on what employers cannot do. For instance the A.D.A. states that
"employers
may not ask job applicants about the existence, nature, or severity
of a
disability"(The Americans With Disabilities Act). This is a very
important step in
that it cancels out any possible internal prejudice the
employer may have
despite the regulations set by the A.D.A.
For example if the employer has a pre-concieved notion of what he or she
believes a disabled person can do, this rule will protect the applicant from
such prejudice. Also, the employer
cannot require an
applicant take a medical examination before a job is offered.
Furthermore, that
a job can only be conditioned based on the results of a medical
exam if those
conditions apply to all workers. This
aspect is important
because it places
all the employees of that company on the same level right
form the
beginning.
These measures have been set not only to put
persons with disabilities on level
ground with other
applicants, it also protects thier rights as to the kind of
treatment they
will recieve. Because of this, more and
more people with
disabilities are
going out and applying for jobs. With
the added
assurance and
comfort the A.D.A. provides, disabled workers can go out with
confidence and
apply for almost any position.
There is a certain classification set by A.D.A.
on what constitutes a person
with a
disability, that is if the person has a physical or mental disability
that
substantially limits a major life activity.
Also, in order to be protected by the A.D.A. this person must have a
long standing record of this disability and how it impairs his or her
life. Once this has been established and
the person has been hired there are still other guidelines set by the A.D.A. on
how the employer goes about bringing this person into the company.
This can be a very sensitive area for employer,
applicant and existing
employees. Because of the fact that the person has a
disability, undue assumptions made by all parties involved. For instance, the new employee with the
disabilitiy may assume that the existing employees will think that he or she
needs help with many trivial things. Or the employer may tell the other workers
to watch over this person for a while.
What should be happening is what ever happens when any other person
comes in for a new job,
that is
introductions, respect, and of course training. The guidelines for introducing a disabled
worker are manualized in a book entitled "Employers Guide to The Americans
With Disabilities Act, Second Edition."
Requirements of
the Employer
Probably the most important aspect of hiring a
person with a disability is to
determine if that
person is qualified to perform the job that he or she is applying for. There is a standard definition of what
defines a qualified person, "...an individual with a disability who, with
or without reasonable accommodations, can perform the essential function of the
employment position that such individual holds or desires"(Frierson, p.
106). This means that a worker is qualified
to hold any job that he or she can perform without an excess of changes to the
business itself, as stated by the Americans With Disabilities Act.
There is one aspect of the hiring process that
could be mistaken as discrimination, but is not. That is the employer is free to hire the most
qualified person for the job. For
example, if there are two applicants for a secretarial job, applicant A types
65 words per minute and applicant B, who happens to have a disability only
types 50 words per minute, even if the slower typing rate is caused by the
disability, the employer should hire applicant A because A is the most
qualified for the job. However, there
are exceptions to every rule, and this is no different. Each instance is case sensitive and must be
handled accordingly. If there were two
applicants for a telephone operator, both are equally qualified but one has a
hearing impairment which would require an amplifier placed on the headset. This is not cause for choosing the applicant
with no disabilities, for the
reason that a
telephone amplifier only costs a few dollars and is not considered to be an
excessive accommodation.
In Frierson's book, "Employers Guide to
The Americans With Disabilities Act",
There are five
practical tips on hiring practices which will keep employers
from violating
any laws on hiring practices as stated in the A.D.A.:
1. In determining if a person with a disability
can perform the job,
consider only essential tasks of the job.
2.
Consider all reasonable accommodations.
3. After
applying 1 and 2, treat job applicants with disabilities the same
as
applicants without disabilities.
4. Hire
the person who is most qualified.
5. Avoid
blanket rules. Look at each applicant as
an individual.
Decide if the individual is the most
qualified to perform the
essential job tasks, after reasonable accommodations are considered.
These steps are
very important not only to the disabled worker, but to the
person hiring the
worker. This protects the employee's
right to choose whomever he deems to be the most qualified. After everything is said and done and the
employer selects the most qualified worker, and that worker happens to be
disabled, there are some accommodations to the workplace that may have to take
place.
Accommodations
made for the disabled are essential to that person becoming a
successful team
member of any organization, for the reason that it allows this
person to do
things independently and without having to wait for assistance.
"The
Americans With Disabilities Act requires employers to make: reasonable
accommodations to
the known physical or mental limitations of an otherwise
qualified
individual with a disability who is an applicant or an
employee..."(Frierson, p.138).
There is a list of reasonable accommodations as stated by the A.D.A.,
such changes include making existing facilities accessible to those who have a
disability. Also acquisition or
modification of existing equipment to accommodate all workers. On the other hand, there are no set lists of
examples that are considered to be in excess for an employer to provide,
however there are some basic guidelines for them to follow when making this
decision. For example, the
accommodations are too expensive for that
particular
company to provide. Also, the
accommodation is seen to interfere
with the
facility's ability to conduct business. An employer can be charged
with
discrimination if that employer claims excess accommodation without researching
all the possibilities. An employer
should never assume that accommodation is impossible, there is a service
provided by the "President's Committee on Employment of People with
Disabilities, called the Job Accommodation Network(JAN). JAN has literally tens of thousands of ideas
and suggestions on successful changes that have been made to
companies"(Frierson, p.165). So now
there is no excuse for employers to make about hiring a disabled worker,
regardless of the situation.
The first two steps in the addition of a
disabled worker are in place, the
hiring and the
accommodations. Now there need to be
programs in place in order
to effectively
train these workers so they can be introduced into the workplace
and become
successful.
Training of
Employees (with motion disabilities)
Among all the disabilities a person can face
these days, whether it be vision,
hearing, physical
or mental disabilities, there is one aspect of disability
that tops the
list of concern. That is a disability
which impairs motion or
mobility of a
worker. "Whether it is moving from
home to work, form one work
area to another,
or traveling long distances, the ability to get there tops
everyone's list
of concern"(Tracey, p. 175). When a
person has a disability that they never had before, and they find that they
cannot get around the way they did before, it can be very traumatic to this
individual. For instance it can cause
feelings of entrapment and loss of freedom.
However with the assistance of a wheelchair and a specially adapted
vehicle, this person can regain that lost sense of freedom and begin to
re-build some lost self-esteem. Because most jobs out there require some sort
of physical or manual labor, a
person with a
motion impairment of the arms, hands, legs or fingers can cause
some
complications. However with a little
effort and possibly imagination of a
few people almost
all of these obstacles can be overcome.
There are numerous motion or mobility
disabilities that an employer may have to
handle. Some of them are people with amputations,
arthritis, brain damage, or
spinal cord
injuries. Just because there are some
individuals with these and
many other
impairments, does not mean they should be denied the same
opportunities as
any other person has in the workplace.
In most cases there
are some
assistive technologies available for companies and employers to take
advantage
of. All of these are not considered to
be an excess accommodation.
The most obvious
of aids available to a disabled person returning to work is a
wheelchair or
cane. These provide freedom of movement
and independence in and
out of the
office. Another very important, and
relatively inexpensive modification are the installments of ramps and
lifts. If a worker has a disability
which prevents him or her from climbing stairs, ramps or lifts are
essential. With all of the advancements
in modern technology, even a quadriplegic can hold down a job. There are actually innovative programs in
place to integrate the use of these workers either in an office setting or in
their own home.
As mentioned earlier, freedom of movement is important and without it a
disabled person cannot even go out to apply for a job.
This is
where vehicle adaptations play a big role in the lives of Americas disabled citizens. Help with making these adaptations to the
vehicles of disabled workers can be sought through that persons company. Also there are many vehicle manufacturers
that
will re-imberse
some of the expense put out by a company.
Personal Impacts
made by The A.D.A. Regulations
One of the most important characteristics, we
as humans posses is that of
self-respect. And in many cases of disability, individuals
were not born with
any particular
impairment. Once a disability has taken
hold a persons life it
can cause drastic
changes in that persons self-concept, self-worth, and the way
that person views
the world. Before the Americans With
Disabilities Act established a foothold
on ending discrimination against persons with disabilities, these valuable
citizens could begin to crawl their way out of obscurity and into the light of
a completely new world. Regardless of
whether or not the A.D.A. is around, disabled citizens are going to apply for
positions. They had been doing so for
fifty years before the
A.D.A. In that time, the numbers of workers with
disabilities grew from a few,
to a few
thousand, to a few million. The change
in trend is in direct correlation to the A.D.A. and the statutes set by it in
the workplace. First of all, Title I of
The Americans With Disabilities Act, ends all discrimination against disables
workers. This gives an opportunity for
some people who might have been to scared to apply, a chance to do otherwise
and to do so on equal grounds. It also
relieved some of the stress that may have been felt by the employer because the
guidelines are very clear and they are very easy to understand.
Also when it comes to the actual job performed
by the disabled worker, this
worker wants the
opportunity to perform his or her job to the best possible
standards, just
like any other worker. This is where the
importance of the
special training
programs and associations that are designed to aid in this
aspect come into
play. Not only are the regulations
helpful to the employer and the employee, but a creative person can provide a
sense of accomplishment
and even help to
create a bond of understanding around all who are involved.
For example, the case of "a potato inspector who was
required to core out bad
spots in
potatoes. Carpal tunnel syndrome
drastically reduced his ability to
perform the
task. An adapted potato corer mounted on
a table allowed him to
continue working
at a cost of less than $33"(Frierson, p.161). It is things
like this that
allow persons with disabilities to function as a productive
member of
society. Or what is thought to be a
productive member, in that this
person can be
completely independent both in the home and in the workplace.
Technology, persistence, and understanding
makes it all happen.
Now go back and
look at the person who had a disability take control of his or
her life. That person is no longer, hiding in the
shadows, he is out, proudly
contributing and
living his life to the best of his ability.
Also this person
can support himself
with a regular paycheck, not a government aid or the help
of family and
friends. This aspect in particular is of
extreme importance to
many disabled
Americans. The ability to survive on
their own, not having to be
dependent on
someone or some group to provide food, clothing or shelter, isn't
that what we all
want anyway? That is why the Americans
With Disabilities Act
is the most
important precedent set in the struggle to end all discrimination against
disabled people. Although there will always
be some discrimination and
prejudice against
all groups in society, at least now one of those groups has
the opportunity
to prove themselves in an unforgiving society.
WORKS CITED
1. The
Americans With Disabilities Act Title I, 1994
2.
Frierson, James G. EMPLOYERS GUIDE TO THE AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT, SECOND EDITION, The
Bureau of National Affairs, Inc., 1995
3.
Tracey, William R. Training
Employees with Diabilities, American
Management Association, 1995
WORKS REFERENCED
1. The
Americans With Disabilities Act Title I, 1994
2.
Frierson, James G. EMPLOYERS GUIDE TO THE AMERICANS WITH DISABILITIES ACT, SECOND EDITION, The
Bureau of National Affairs, Inc., 1995
3.
Tracey, William R. Training
Employees with Diabilities, American
Management Association, 1995
4.
Conley, Robert W. The Economics
of Vocational Rehabilitation, The Johns Hopkins Press, 1965
5.
Urbain, Cathleen Supported
Employement: A Step by Step Guide,
PACER center 1992
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