Archive for July 2021

In June 2021, Prentice Williams, the former fire chief of Surfside Beach, South Carolina, retired due to an alleged hostile work environment. News outlets only broke the story in mid-July, but as of this writing, no steps appear to have been taken to address the perceived faults in Surfside Beach’s workplace culture. Williams stated that…

In late June 2021, the U.S. Federal District Court in South Carolina handed down a decision granting summary judgment in a case brought against Publix Super Markets, Inc. by a former employee. The employee was terminated in January 2018, ostensibly for disobeying corporate policy to refrain from physical interaction with alleged shoplifters, but plaintiff argued…

Religion is one of the protected classes under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, along with race/color, sex/gender, and national origin. This means that with very rare exceptions, discrimination against a person based on religion, real or perceived, is unlawful. An employer who is found to have engaged in discrimination on religious…

In early 2021, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill offered a tenure-track position as the Knight Chair in Race and Investigative Journalism to Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, creator of the 1619 Project. However, after an ‘outcry’ from conservative trustees and donors, the university reneged on its job offer, instead extending a 5-year…

When a person is hired at a new company, they enter into one of two types of employment. Most workers are under what is known as at-will employment, which means they can be terminated at any time, for any reason. Employees under contract, however, have more protections against arbitrary termination. It can, however, be difficult…