Late last year, US food processing company Cargill fired 150 Muslim workers from its beef processing plant in Colorado after a dispute over prayer breaks. After facing protests about the layoffs, the company changed its rehire policy earlier this month, allowing the fired employees to reapply for their jobs. The incident points to a growing challenge in the American workplace: what companies can do to accommodate their employees’ faiths.

The federal Civil Rights Act requires public and private employers to accommodate their workers’ religious needs as long as doing so won’t impose more than a minimal cost to their business. But religious discrimination claims have nearly doubled since 2001, according to the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Last year, a case made it all the way to the Supreme Court, when a Muslim woman sued clothing company Abercrombie & Fitch for passing her over for a job because she wore a hijab, or headscarf. The court ruled 8-1 in her favor.

“Religious discrimination in the workplace is an issue that continues to fester in the US, to the particular detriment of minority faiths like Muslims, Sikhs and Seventh-day Adventists,” said James Sonne, founding director of Stanford Law School’s Religious Liberty Clinic. “The problem often stems from ignorance, but religious or cultural hostility has played a significant role in recent years.”