Our Firm is happy to have two Fordham Law students on board this summer. Please join us in welcoming Rafita Ahlam and Kacie Candela!
Rafita Ahlam is a rising 3L at Fordham Law. She is currently the Writing and Research Editor for Volume 44 of the International Law Journal, where she works with students interested in publishing their notes. Additionally, she’s a member of Fordham’s Moot Court Board and the Board of Student Advisors. Rafita’s interest in employment and labor law arose from participating in discussions about Title VII in her classes and from competing in a Moot Court competition centered on an age discrimination claim under ADEA.Prior to joining Berke-Weiss Law, Rafita interned as an Immigration Intern with the International Rescue Committee and as a Fair Hearings Intern with the NYC Department of Social Services. Before law school, she worked for two years as a paralegal at a plaintiff’s side personal injury firm. She graduated from SUNY Binghamton in 2016 with a Bachelor’s in Political Science. In her spare time, Rafita enjoys weight-lifting, traveling, and NYC’s restaurant scene.
Kacie is a rising 2L at Fordham University School of Law, where she is the Employment Discrimination Chair of the Workers' Rights Advocates. Prior to law school, she covered New York City and State politics for NPR-affiliate radio station WFUV, where she produced and co-hosted the Prickly Politics podcast. Over three seasons, Prickly Politics took an in-depth look at local elections as well as workplace sexual harassment in the NYS Legislature and activist efforts to change the state's sexual harassment and discrimination law.Kacie is also a writer and podcast producer for the news site PassBlue.com, which covers the United Nations Headquarters in New York City. She produces UN-Scripted, a podcast that aims to make the UN comprehensible to the English-speaking global public and humanize the diplomats who serve there.Kacie is a proud alumna of the Fordham College of Rose Hill Honors Program, where she studied English and International Political Economy. She serves as a board member on the Fordham College Alumni Association. Kacie enjoys cycling, hiking, yoga and reading. She is an avid listener of WNYC and reader of the Atlantic Magazine.
The Department of Labor revisions to FFCRA, which went into effect on September 16, 2020, have been widely anticipated and it is hoped that they will reduce some of the issues surrounding paid leave and employees qualification for taking protected leaves.
It might seem like vanilla stuff for some of the world’s almost capitalized companies in the world to provide extra support to employees during a global pandemic, but not so at companies like Facebook and Twitter, where a rift has formed between parents, non-parents and employers over the companies’ policy responses to daycare and school closures.
It appears employers continue to terminate workers who are supposed to be protected under the FFCRA. This week, we’ve highlighted several cases where employees were waiting for test results or already diagnosed with Covid-19 and subsequently fired when seeking paid leave.
