The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is the federal agency that oversees laws and regulations related to communications in the United States and US territories. The FCC is responsible for enforcing Title IV of the ADA. It has also established a Disability Rights Office.
A major life activity is something significant that a person does in their day-to-day life. The ADA Amendments Act (ADAAA) describes a major life activity as follows:
Major life activities include, but are not limited to, caring for oneself, performing manual tasks, seeing, hearing, eating, sleeping, walking, standing, lifting, bending, speaking, breathing, learning, reading, concentrating, thinking, communicating, and working…it also includes the operation of a major bodily function, including but not limited to, functions of the immune system, normal cell growth, digestive, bowel, bladder, neurological, brain, respiratory, circulatory, endocrine, and reproductive functions.
The ADAAA does not provide an exhaustive list, but it does offer quite a few examples.
A marginal function is a job-related task that is not an essential aspect of the job. Because this task is non-essential, it could be removed from an employee’s job responsibilities if the employee were unable to perform the task due to a disability. In fact, removing a marginal function could be a reasonable accommodation. For example, consider a person who works as a housekeeper at a hotel. This person can walk well but cannot walk up and down stairs. If a small part of the job is to clean the stairwell, the hotel could reassign that responsibility to another housekeeping staff member as a reasonable accommodation.
Marginal functions are different from essential functions—essential functions are tasks that are core aspects of a job.
The National Council on Disability (NCD) is an independent federal agency of the US government. It advises the President, Congress, and other federal agencies on disability-related policies, programs, and procedures. For example, in coordination with other interested parties, the NCD drafted the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).
One of 10 ADA centers throughout the United States, the Northeast ADA Center aims to assist people in New Jersey, New York, Puerto Rico, and the US Virgin Islands with ADA-related concerns. The Northeast ADA Center provides information, guidance, and training on all aspects of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). It also provides this website! It is based in the Yang-Tan Institute on Employment and Disability in the ILR School at Cornell University, in Ithaca, New York.
Person-first language is a way to refer to someone who has a disability. With person-first language, the person is mentioned before their disability. For example, “a woman who is hard-of-hearing” is person-first language. In contrast, “a hard-of-hearing woman” is not person-first language. Person-first language conveys the idea that the person as a whole is more important than just their disability. Also, historically, people with disabilities have often been excluded or segregated from society. Person-first language may help to address this historical barrier.
Note that if a person prefers to be referred to without person-first language (such as “a Deaf man”), you should follow that preference.
Physical accessibility makes it possible for people to enter a building and use its features. With adequate physical accessibility, everyone—including, for example, a person using a wheelchair, walker, or other mobility aid—is able to enter the building and access all aspects of the building that anyone else can access. Curb cuts, ramps, elevators, accessible bathrooms, Braille on signs, and much more all play a role in physical accessibility. The 2010 ADA Standards for Accessible Design includes technical specifications for providing physical accessibility.
In the context of Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), program access is a technical term. Very generally, program access means that a person with a disability can participate in a program or service offered by a public entity (state or local government), so long as there is some reasonable way to make it happen. One reasonable way would be to move a class, meeting, or other offering to an accessible location, if one is needed. (This is somewhat different from the type of access required by the ADA in Title III for public accommodations.)
In the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the definition of disability includes a list with three items. When talking about the ADA, people often use the term prong to refer to one of those listed items, saying things like “the first prong of the definition.”
Generally speaking, a public accommodation is a business or nonprofit organization open to the public where commerce takes place. Commerce happens when things are bought or sold, or when services are bought or sold. Examples are restaurants, stadiums, and hospitals. Additional examples include daycare centers, private schools, golf courses, and zoos. Private transportation—such as a touring bus company, taxi service, or cruise line—also falls into this category.
Title III of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) covers public accommodations, and it sets out twelve broad categories for what is a public accommodation. If you’re curious about the details, see the Definitions section of Title III.
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