Science Curriculum Development with Next Generation Standards: Meeting the Needs of In-Service Teachers

The Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) bring new opportunities to American classrooms, with their emphasis on investigation, reliance on data, and constructing explanations and lines of argument based on evidence. However, they also pose considerable challenges both to teachers and students. Years of minimal science instruction during the era of No Child Left Behind (NCLB) have left a generation of students unfamiliar with the idea of questioning, and a professional cohort of teachers with little experience with inquiry curriculum or confidence in their mastery of science content. This leaves a gap for curriculum design. This study assessed the needs of a small rural school district’s teachers as the district moves toward implementation of NGSS in grades K-12. Based on the needs assessment, I developed (a) a set of model lessons integrating the NGSS with state Environmental Education standards as well as interdisciplinary connections such as science applications of mathematics and arts, and (b) a plan for professional development to build capacity in curriculum design and implementation for inquiry science, in the context of a school garden

Modifying At-Will Employment Contracts

This Article addresses the problem of “mid-term” modification of employment—the common employer practice of introducing adverse changes in incumbent employees’ terms of employment on penalty of termination. It calls for a universal reasonable notice rule under which courts would enforce mid-term modifications only where the worker received reasonable advance notice of the change. An employer’s sudden imposition of new terms prevents employees from exercising what is often their only form of bargaining power —the ability to credibly threaten departure. Rejecting retrograde judicial approaches that turn on the presence or absence of consideration, the Article argues for a “procedural good faith” rule that directly polices the risk of coercion consistent with contemporary contract modification law. Courts should enforce mid-term modifications only where the employer provides enough advance notice to allow the employee time not only to meaningfully consider the proposed change, but also to compare and secure alternate work

Noncompetes, Human Capital, and Contract Formation: What Employment Law Can Learn From Family Law

Despite historical attention to such issues, the current approach to noncompete enforcement has been consistently criticized from a range of perspectives for not appropriately protecting the interests of either party. In Part II of this Essay, I take those criticisms as my starting point, discussing contemporary changes in the labor economy and in the popular expectations surrounding employment relationships that challenge the existing doctrinal test. In Parts III and IV, I consider possible changes to the doctrine, focusing primarily on the trend toward greater recognition of the contractual force of premarital agreements between spouses. In so doing, I use the ultimate relational contract to advocate for greater attention to formalities in the penultimate relational contract. \u2

Public Law and Private Process: Toward an Organizational Justice Model of Equal Employment Quality for Caregiver

This article considers the relationship between prescriptive law and voluntary employer behavior in redressing the structural exclusion of working caregivers. In the last decade, several courts interpreting the Americans with Disabilities Act have held that employers are statutorily required to engage in an interactive process with workers to identify ways of accommodating their disabilities. In so doing, they have created procedural rights for workers that are distinguishable from and supplemental to the substantive right to reasonable accommodation afforded by the statute. This move resonates with developments in Title VII jurisprudence, such as the creation of an affirmative defense to harassment liability for employers who implement preventative policies. It also exemplifies what can be thought of as a second generation response to structural exclusion, one that calls for greater cooperation between advocates of reform and employers themselves, in recognition of the fact that stimulating viable private solutions and a social commitment to change are essential components of any enduring workplace reform agenda. Drawing on this literature and courts\u27 development of the Americans with Disabilities Act interactive process requirement, this article suggests that a comparable approach can be useful in redressing other types of workplace disparities, such as the attachment and promotion gap between working caregivers and unencumbered workers. It suggests that emphasis on procedural protection for workers may incentivize the development of positive voluntary procedures for preventing and correcting structural impediments to the advancement and inclusion of these workers. In so doing, it refines the relationship between public regulation and private behavior in reaching the goal of true workplace equality

Accommodation Subverted: The Future of Work/Family Initiatives in a \u27Me, Inc.\u27 World

This article considers the viability of mandated employer accommodation of family caregiving in a work culture that prizes employee mobility and independence. Extant accommodation mandates, such as the Americans with Disabilities Act and the Family Medical Leave Act, have been only moderately successful in deconstructing discriminatory work structures that operate to exclude underrepresented workers. Court decisions interpreting those laws frequently invoke equality principles to limit their reach and preserve employer discretion, while decisions favorable to disadvantaged plaintiffs have often occasioned popular backlash. These circumstances call into question the efficacy of accommodation as a vehicle for achieving results-based equality for caregivers. Such difficulties must be analyzed against the development of what I call a “Me, Inc.” work culture, an environment typified by worker assumption of responsibility for training and education, increased employer demand for “extra-role” behavior, significant worker mobility and a corresponding decline in long-term employment relationships. The emerging view of workers as autonomous companies is in direct tension with society’s historical designation of the employer as the party primarily responsible for accommodating the “life-cycle” needs of its workforce. On a practical level, changes in the nature and duration of work relationships mean that employers will have limited ability to absorb costs associated with accommodation, and, more significantly, that any judicial interpretation or popular conception of the employer’s duty to accommodate will be constrained by the expectation of employee self-reliance. The article therefore cautions that expansive efforts to mandate employer accommodation of caregiving risk internalizing the norms they reject and are unlikely to succeed on their own in establishing a wholly new work ethic more inclusive of family caregiving. It proposes instead a preliminary three-part approach to redressing caregiver disadvantage that corresponds to the three pre-existing channels of federal employment regulation: vigorous pursuit of class-based discrimination claims, reinvigoration of collective bargaining, and the creation of a government-administered system of wage replacement that incentivizes employer-initiated programs to assist caregivers

Temporary Termination: A Layoff Law Blueprint for the COVID Era

The COVID-19 pandemic led to Congress’ passage of two groundbreaking pieces of legislation, mitigating the financial toll on individuals unable to work due to the pandemic. The protections include: paid sick time, job protected leave for routine childcare, and expanded unemployment benefits. The current worker protection system affords insufficient rights in the event of an economic termination. The accommodations arising from the COVID-19 pandemic have long been demanded and could pave the way for enduring employment reform. This Article encourages the recognition of “temporary termination” for employees terminated for economic reasons. Arnow-Richman advocates for the following “temporary termination” rights: advance notice or its equivalent severance pay; ability of employers to classify such workers as temporarily separated; streamlined employee access to unemployment benefits; entitlement to reinstatement when work becomes available; and a deferred severance pay if the employer is unable to reinstate the employment

Mainstreaming Employment Contract Law: The Common Law Case for Reasonable Notice of Termination

This Article simultaneously exposes a fundamental error in employment termination doctrine and a paradox in contract law jurisprudence. Contemporary employment law has developed under the assumption that at-will parties may terminate their relationship both without reason and without notice. This Article argues that the second half of this formulation—the idea that parties reserve the procedural right to terminate without notice—is neither historically supported nor legally correct. Employment at will, as originally expressed, was a mere duration presumption reflecting America’s rejection of the predominant British rule favoring one-year employment terms. While subsequent case law expanded the presumption in various ways, a reinterpretation that requires advance notice of termination remains compatible with the way in which most contemporary courts articulate the rule. In fact, an examination of general contract law reveals that in a variety of nonemployment contexts, courts impose on parties to an indefinite relationship the duty to provide reasonable notice while still safeguarding their right to terminate at will. Such an obligation serves not only as a gap filler in the face of contractual silence, but also as a good faith limitation on parties’ exercise of substantive discretion. Absent such a notice requirement, employment is an illusory relationship, one that lacks the modicum of consideration necessary to create a binding contract. While courts have sought to circumvent this problem by theorizing employment as a unilateral contract, that formulation is ill-suited to the reality that both sides generally anticipate an ongoing, dynamic relationship. This Article recasts employment as a bilateral contract terminable at will by either party upon reasonable notice. Establishing a reasonable notice obligation will grant terminated workers paid transition time to seek new employment and develop new skills. At the same time, adopting this rule paves the way for a more unified body of contract law. The case for deviations from general contract principles is strongest where context-specific rules fulfill the reasonable expectations of the weaker party. Employment-specific contract rules, as they currently stand, do precisely the opposite. While ordinary contract law cannot adequately protect workers’ interests in all circumstances, this Article demonstrates that in at least some instances mainstream doctrine, properly understood and applied, can produce results that are both good for workers and in harmony with existing law

Infections Following Orthotopic Liver Transplantation

The epidemiology of infections associated with orthotopic liver transplantation is summarized herein, and approaches to prophylaxis are outlined. Infection is a major complication following orthotopic liver transplantation, and more than half of transplant recipients develop at least one infection. The risk of infection is highest in the first month after transplantation, and the most common pathogens are bacteria and cytomegalovirus (CMV). Bacterial infections usually occur in the first month, arise in the abdomen, and are caused by aerobes. The peak incidence of CMV infection is late in the first month and early in the second month after transplantationn. CMV syndromes include fever and neutropenia, hepatitis, pneumonitis, gut ulceration, and disseminated infection. Other significant problems are Candida intraabdominal infection, Herpes simplex mucocutaneous infection or hepatitis, adenovirus hepatitis, and Pneumocystis carinii pneumonia

Response to Working Group on Chapter 2 of the Proposed Restatement of Employment Law: Putting the Restatement in its Place

Like most of the contributors to this symposium, I come to bury the Restatement, not to praise it. A fair reading of the ALI’s proposed Chapter 2, on termination and employment at will, reveals a document deeply, if not irretrievably, flawed in both its conception and execution. Principal among my complaints is that the draft neither presents an integrated approach to contractual terms of employment, nor takes a position on the appropriateness of contract as a vehicle for creating employment terms. Thus, in the most benign terms, the draft repackages the common law, adding nothing of value in the process