"Claim of the System Committee of the Brotherhood that:

(1) The Agreement was violated when the Carrier improperly and unjustly disqualified and removed Machine Operator D. Johnson from his ballast regulator position on Gang 9181 on April 13, 2007 (System File MW-07-84/1477297 MPR).

(2) As a consequence of the violation referred to in Part (1) above, the aforesaid disqualification should be dropped and Claimant D. Johnson shall now have his ballast regulator operator foreman qualifications reinstated and he shall be compensated for the difference in pay between the machine operator restricted rate of pay and the spiker operator rate of pay for all straight time and overtime hours worked by Gang 9181 beginning April 13, 2007 and continuing."

The carrier or carriers and the employee or employees involved in this dispute are respectively carrier and employee within the meaning of the Railway Labor Act, as approved June 21,1934.

This Division of the Adjustment Board has jurisdiction over the dispute involved herein.

Parties to said dispute were given due notice of hearing thereon.

On April 13, 2007, the Claimant received a disqualification letter from Supervisor S. Mills disqualifying him from a ballast regulator position on Gang 9181. The reasons stated were:

"Reason(s) not qualified:

[O]perator (Johnson can not properly final dress track and can not meet the production needs of this gang.

Comments:

Operator Johnson does not possess the skills to properly final dress the ballast section and does not meet the production standards of UPRR production surfacing gangs."

Supervisor Mills also rated the Claimant as "unsatisfactory" in the following categories:

"Demonstrates confidence while operating (controls)

Ensures standard ballast section (shoulder, slope)

Toe line at end of ballast slope."

Whether an employee can be disqualified from a position he or she holds is the Carrier's determination, subject only to limited review by the Board under a

standard which requires the Organization to demonstrate that the Carrier's decision was arbitrary. See Third Division Award 36957:

"The Carrier determines whether its Foremen have the fitness and ability to perform their duties, subject to review by the Board only as to whether the Carrier's decision was arbitrary. Third Division Award 35808 (`Qualification, fitness and ability to perform a job are determinations to be made by the Carrier, subject only to limited review by the Board as to whether the Carrier was arbitrary in its determination')."

See also, Third Division Award 36486 ("It is well established that in cases of fitness and ability, the Carrier has the management prerogative to judge fitness and ability and the burden shifts to the Organization to demonstrate that the Carrier's decision was arbitrary, capricious, or unreasonable.")

Under the limited review standard discussed in those Awards, we are unable to find that the Organization has shown that the Carrier was arbitrary when it determined that the Claimant was not qualified to continue to hold the ballast regulator position on Gang 9181.

The Organization's arguments do not change the result.

First, disqualification from a position is not discipline. See Third Division Award 36957 supra:

"The Claimant's disqualification from the Track Foreman's position was not discipline .... See Third Division Award 29307 between the parties (where the employee was in the position for six months and was then disqualified):

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