From: shawn keen 
Subject: Re: woman fired for *not using talking cmputer.
hmm interesting.
wunder what the nfb's view on this is.
it seems like her job would come first and she would have done what she
could to keep it.
considering the suposed 70% unimployment rate.
At 10:03 AM 7/19/97 -0500, you wrote:
>
>
>
>The times are a-changing.  The court ruled below that a social service 
>agency was within its right to fire a blind employee who rejected a 
>computer with speech synthesis to handle her paperwork, insisting on a 
>cctv instead.  When that didn't work, she aquesed to the computer, only 
>to demand training from her employer.  When her performance showed no 
>progress because she wasn't getting the hang of the talking computer, she 
>demanded a reader.  when her employer developed a pperformance 
>improvement plan that focused on the computer but no reader, the woman,  
>Ellen Smith, balked and refused to sign it.  she charged discrimination, 
>which the court did not accept. 
>
>I wonder if this is a sign that employer's are accepting adaptive 
>technology as effective accomodations for blind persons.  I wonder also 
>if the woman was so resistant to the talking computer because she didn't 
>know how to use one and eas unfamilar with the benifits.
>
>kelly 
>
>
>            Copyright (c) 1997 The Bureau of National Affairs, Inc.
>                            (Article No. 41962316)
>
>Disabilities Discrimination
>OHIO CLINIC DID NOT VIOLATE ADA
>IN DISCHARGING UNPRODUCTIVE, BLIND COUNSELOR
> 
>   WASHINGTON (BNA) -- An Ohio clinic did not violate the Americans with
>Disabilities Act by discharging a blind counselor who refused to sign a
>performance improvement plan, when she failed to meet productivity standards
>after more than a year on the job, according to the U.S. Court of Appeals 
or
>the Sixth Circuit.
> 
>   Even if plaintiff Ellen Smith could prove that the Blick Clinic failed to
>reasonably accommodate her to perform her job,  the appeals court said, she
>could not show that the clinic or its managers discharged her because of her
>disability. "Smith's refusal to sign a commitment to embark on a program of
>improvement constituted a sufficient, non-discriminatory, cause for
>termination," the court said, in affirming a lower court's summary judgment
>in favor of the employer (Smith v. The Blick Clinic Inc., CA 6, 96-3246,
>7/3/97).
> 
>   Smith was hired in 1992 as a counselor-trainee at the Blick Clinic, a
>not-for-profit organization that provides counseling, diagnostic, and
>treatment services to people with developmental disabilities. Virtually 
lind
>from birth, she has an artificial right eye and, because of glaucoma, very
>little vision in her left eye. The clinic management selected her for the 
ob
>in part because they felt she could serve as a model for clients and invited
>her to make suggestions for ways to accommodate her disability.
> 
>   The job required a substantial amount of paperwork, which Smith initially
>told the clinic she felt she could manage with the help of her 
losed-circuit
>television which displayed written material on a large screen. She declined
>the clinic's suggestion that she be provided with a computer equipped with a
>voice synthesizer. After six months on the job, however, her performance was
>deficient and she agreed to begin using the "talking computer," which was to
>be ordered by Blick. As another accommodation, she was given additional time
>to complete certain patient reports, but she was also informed that she
>needed to improve her productivity.
> 
>   Smith's performance improved over the next three months, but then, in the
>court's words, "things went downhill from there." Smith was farther behind 
n
>her paperwork and her productivity diminished further. Her supervisor set 
ut
>certain benchmarks for her to meet within 90 days in order to keep her job.
>Smith objected in writing to the evaluation. She noted that she had only
>received  the special computer recently and had not been trained on it. The
>clinic agreed to give her an additional 15 days to meet the stated goals.
> 
>   Three months later, with the computer still not "up and running," Smith
>asked for a reader to help with her paperwork. That request was not 
ddressed
>by management, however, and soon afterwards, Smith was told she had not
>accomplished her goals. The clinic developed another performance improvement
>plan, containing weekly benchmarks and told Smith she would be fired, if she
>did not sign the plan. Smith, unhappy with the plan and unsure that she 
ould
>be assigned a reader, refused to sign the document and was fired. She filed
>suit under the ADA, claiming her former employer failed to provide 
easonable
>accommodation of her disability, but a federal judge granted the clinic's
>motion for summary judgment.
> 
>   Affirming the lower court, the Sixth Circuit found no violation of the
>federal disabilities law.
> 
>   The court cited Smith's acknowledgment that the reason for her 
ermination
>was her refusal to sign the performance improvement plan, and determined 
hat
>the employer had acted legally.
> 
>   "Blick deemed this (the refusal to sign the document) insubordination, 
nd
>was within its right in thinking it to be so," the appeals court said. "An
>employer is entitled to insist that an employee, disabled or otherwise,
>subscribe to a remedial program aimed at the employee's satisfaction of the
>employer's standards."
> 
>   The employer, the court added, could not legally have made the request if
>it was only a  pretext for discrimination, but Smith provided "nothing more
>than allegations" to support that theory. If Smith had signed the 
mprovement
>plan, as she was ordered, she still could have argued that the plan failed 
o
>accommodate her, the court observed.
> 
>   "We conclude that, under the circumstances, Smith's refusal to sign a
>commitment to embark on a program of improvement constituted a sufficient,
>non-discriminatory, cause for termination," the court said. "That being the
>case, even if Smith could prove at trial that Blick failed to make 
easonable
>accommodations that would have allowed her to perform her job, Smith cannot
>show that Blick or the individual defendants discharged her solely by reason
>of her handicap. Therefore, we hold that the district court properly granted
>summary judgment to Blick."
> 
>   Judges Danny Boggs, Alice Batchelder, and Martha Daughtry joined in the
>opinion.
> 
>   -- By Nancy Montwieler
>
>
>
>
>
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