What protections does the ADA provide to veterans with disabilities?
When is a veteran with a service-connected disability protected by the ADA?
May an employer ask if an applicant is a "disabled veteran" if it is seeking to hire someone with a disability?
So, how did you do? (I went 1-for-3...as if!)
If you're stumped or confused, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has your back. Earlier this week, the EEOC released this guide for employers, about protections for veterans with service-connected disabilities differ under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and the Uniformed Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), and how employers can prevent disability-based discrimination and provide reasonable accommodations.
As the year draws to a close, let's take a look back at the most popular posts at The Employer Handbook in 2011, based on number of hits:
5. Social media and the workplace. School teacher Natalie Munroe made several appearances on the blog this year. Remember her? She was the blogging school teacher who wrote that her students were "utterly loathsome in all imaginable ways." Although, Ms. Munroe eventually returned to work, her experience is a sound reminder to always think twice before hitting "send." You can read the fifth-most-popular post, "Yes, you CAN discipline employees who abuse social media" here.
4. I'm a poet and I don't even know it. I'm not sure what inspired the fourth-most-popular post. It must have been a slow news day. How else do I come up with the idea to Haiku -- verbing a noun, sorry -- about recent employment-law decisions from the U.S. Supreme Court?
3. FMLA remains a hot issue.This one surprised me. The third-most-popular post is about FMLA legislation in Pennsylvania that never passed.
2. Short and sweet. The second-most-popular post was one of my shortest. I merely announced that the EEOC had finalized its ADAAA regulations. (Note to self: keep it short)
1. Yeah, I know, you only clicked "by accident." This was a runaway. Not even close. To put things in perspective, nearly 4% of all page views at The Employer Handbook were on this one story. Not to come off as too vain -- I'm sure I've done that already in my other stellar posts -- but nearly four times as many viewers checked out the number-one post than my blog biography. What else can I say? In the end, sex sells. (Note to self: keep it sexy).
Thank you to everyone who made The Employer Handbook such a success in its first year. We'll be back on January 3, 2012, the official one-year anniversary of the blog, with something short and sexy employment-law related. But possibly short and sexy.
Just over a month ago, the Supreme Court unanimously held that an employer violates Title VII of the Civil Rights Act if it takes action against an employee who is in the same "zone of interest" as another employee who complains about unlawful harassment in the workplace.
Yesterday, in an opinion written by Justice Antonin Scalia, the Court in Staub v. Proctor Hospital once again unanimously made it easier for individuals to pursue discrimination claims against their current and former employers. You can read a copy of the Court's opinion here.
My analysis and the immediate impact this opinion will have on employers after the jump.
To improve the reinstatement rights of returning war veterans, and to add more enforcement teeth to the Uniform Services Employment and Reemployment Rights Act (USERRA), Pennsylvania Senator Robert Casey reintroduced the Servicemembers Access to Justice Act (SAJA) last week.
Quick quiz: 
Just over a month ago, the Supreme Court unanimously held that 
