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  • Date:

    Doe v. The Univ. of N.C. Sys. (W.D. N.C. Mar. 4, 2024)

    Memorandum of Decision and Order granting-in-part and denying-in-part Defendants’ Motions to Dismiss. Plaintiff, a former student at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and recipient of an independently funded full scholarship, brought Title IX, due process, contract, and tort claims against the University and numerous officials after he was expelled for alleged sexual misconduct. Plaintiff alleged that he did not receive proper notification of the accusations, that he was not allowed to cross-examine his four accusers, that evidence was withheld from him and exculpatory evidence was not considered, and that investigators and members of hearing panels showed gender bias. The court found the factual allegations sufficient for plaintiff to proceed on his Title IX erroneous outcome, due process, and contract claims. The court also found the alleged procedural flaws sufficient to state a claim for negligent infliction of emotional distress claim, but it found no allegation that the flaws were intended to inflict emotional distress. The court also permitted plaintiff to proceed on his tortious interference with a contract claim, finding that he had sufficiently alleged that the University had communicated information about the flawed disciplinary proceedings to the foundation funding his scholarship.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Due Process | Litigation, Mediation & Arbitration | Students | Title IX & Student Sexual Misconduct | Tort Litigation

  • Date:

    Niman v. Mont. Univ. Sys. (D. Mont. Feb. 23, 2024)

    Opinion and Order granting-in-part and denying-in-part Defendants’ Motion to Dismiss. Plaintiffs, current and former students in professional degree programs at the University of Montana who were classified as nonresidents for tuition and fees at the time of their enrollment, brought due process and equal protection challenges to several features of the University’s residency policy, alleging that they were unconstitutionally denied reclassification to in-state residency status. The court permitted plaintiffs to proceed, first, on their facial challenge to a provision that denies reclassification to professional degree students who cannot show that they were residents for at least 12 consecutive months for a purpose other than postsecondary education prior to their first semester of the professional degree program. Next, the court permitted plaintiffs to proceed in their as applied, but not their facial challenge to the policy’s general but rebuttable presumption that students enrolled in at least half of a full-time credit load cannot establish residency on the grounds that the policy provides students in professional degree programs fewer bases for rebutting that presumption. Finally, the court also permitted plaintiffs to proceed on their challenges to the policy’s requirement that a student wait 12 months before seeking reclassification and demonstrate less than 50% dependence on out-of-state sources of income and financial support, as well as on their claim that the policy requires them to pay tuition at rates disproportionate to the funding provided by Montana taxpayers.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Due Process | Equal Protection

  • Date:

    Bhattacharya v. Murray (4th Cir. Feb. 26, 2024)

    Opinion affirming summary judgment in favor of the Defendants. Plaintiff, a former medical student at the University of Virginia who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder with psychosis, brought First Amendment retaliation and due process claims against the University after he was suspended for failures of professionalism and then issued a four-year no trespass order (NTO) for online harassment and threats against faculty members. In Fall 2018, a faculty member submitted a Professionalism Concern Card regarding a series of questions plaintiff posed to an American Medical Women’s Association panel on microaggressions. Plaintiff was then involuntarily hospitalized, first, for concerning behavior on the afternoon he received notice of the professionalism concern and, two days later, for threatening behavior directed against his mother. Subsequently, he posted pictures of members of the school’s Academic Standards and Achievement Committee online along with harassing messages. In affirming summary judgment in favor of the University on plaintiff’s First Amendment retaliation claim, a divided panel of the Fourth Circuit found that the evidence overwhelmingly pointed to his confrontational and threatening behavior, rather than his protected academic speech on microaggressions, as the basis of his suspension and disqualification as a medical student. The court also affirmed dismissal of plaintiff’s due process claims, noting that professionalism is an academic rather than disciplinary standard for the medical school and that plaintiff himself did not timely appeal the NTO.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Discrimination, Accommodation, & Diversity | Due Process | First Amendment & Free Speech | Retaliation

  • Date:

    Children’s Health Def. Inc. v. Rutgers, The State Univ. of N.J. (3rd Cir. Feb. 15, 2024)

    Opinion affirming dismissal. Appellants, thirteen students at Rutgers University during Spring 2021, brought statutory and constitutional challenges to the University’s announced COVID-19 vaccine policy requiring that unvaccinated students either take all their classes online or mask and test weekly. In affirming dismissal, the Third Circuit held that the policy was not preempted by the federal Emergency Use Authorization Act because it preserved the students’ right to refuse the vaccine. Turning to their substantive due process claim, the court found no fundamental right to refuse a vaccination and held that the policy was rationally related to the University’s interest in maintaining a healthy student body. It similarly held that their equal protection claim failed because the University had a rational basis for treating vaccinated and unvaccinated students differently.   

    Topics:

    Campus Police, Safety, & Crisis Management | Constitutional Issues | Coronavirus | Due Process | Equal Protection

  • Date:

    Thomas v. Coppin State Univ. (D. Md. Jan. 25, 2024)

    Memorandum Opinion granting Defendants’ Partial Motion to Dismiss. Plaintiff, who was in his first year as a tenure-track assistant professor at Coppin State University, brought discrimination and due process claims against the University after he was placed on paid administrative leave and notified that his appointment would not be renewed after the University received multiple allegations of workplace hostility against him. Plaintiff alleged that a dean and colleagues had been dismissive of his back issues and other health concerns and that officials had not provided support when he sought assistance addressing disruptive student behavior in his classroom. In dismissing his hostile work environment claim, the court found plaintiff had alleged insufficient facts to plead a severe or pervasive hostile environment. In dismissing his due process claim, the court noted that he received a notice of nonrenewal rather than a termination and that he failed to establish a property interest in anything beyond his one-year term appointment.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Disability Discrimination | Discrimination, Accommodation, & Diversity | Due Process

  • Date:

    Shannon v. The Bd. of Trs. of the Univ. of Ill. (C.D. Ill. Jan. 19, 2024)

    Opinion granting Plaintiff’s Motion for Preliminary Injunction. Plaintiff, a basketball player at the University of Illinois who was projected as an NBA lottery draft pick and who has significant income from a name, image, likeness (NIL) contract, brought Title IX and Due Process claims against the University after it suspended him from athletic activities following receipt of an arrest warrant related to a sexual assault he allegedly committed in Kansas. The Division of Intercollegiate Athletics (DIA) suspended him pursuant to its policy permitting it to act “upon receipt of credible information that a student-athlete may have engaged in misconduct … [that], if substantiated, would constitute a Major Offense.” The court declined to order the University to apply its Title IX policy, finding that it did not have control over his Kansas trip, which was for personal social reasons, and that he had not alleged that the decision not to apply the policy was based on his gender. It granted plaintiff’s motion based on his due process claim, holding that (1) based on the terms of the University’s student conduct policy he had a property interest in not being suspended from the team without good cause, and (2) his projected draft pick status and his NIL deal made his occupational liberty interests more than speculative. It then held that he was likely to succeed on his claim that the University denied him due process when it suspended him from play under its DIA policy, which afforded fewer procedural protections than its general student conduct process. 

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Due Process | Student Athlete Issues | Students | Title IX & Student Sexual Misconduct

  • Date:

    Reid v. James Madison Univ. (4th Cir. Jan. 9, 2024)

    Opinion reversing dismissal and remanding for further proceedings. Plaintiff, a former speech instructor and debate team coach at James Madison University, brought Title IX discrimination and due process claims against the University and multiple officials after an investigation found her responsible for having a nonconsensual relationship with a student, alleging various procedural departures from the University’s Title IX policies and procedures. The district court granted summary judgment to the University, finding plaintiff’s claims time-barred because she sued more than two years after her Dean found her responsible for the violation. In reversing and remanding for further proceedings, the Fourth Circuit held for the first time that a Title IX employment discrimination claim becomes complete and present and, thus, that the claim accrues when the University makes clear that a determination of a policy violation is its official position. It then found that information accompanying the Dean’s determination letter also provided her with a deadline for filing an appeal with the Provost and that the University did not otherwise make clear that the Dean’s decision was its official position. Accordingly, it held that plaintiff’s claim accrued only when the Provost upheld the determination of responsibility.

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Discrimination, Accommodation, & Diversity | Due Process | Employee Sexual Misconduct | Sex Discrimination

  • Date:

    Cohen v. Bd. of Trs. of Univ. of Dist. of Columbia (D. D.C. Dec. 5, 2023)

    Memorandum Opinion granting Defendants’ Motion for Summary Judgment. Plaintiff, a former professor at the University of the District of Columbia, brought a due process claim against University officials after he was terminated for failing to submit a required cumulative evaluation portfolio. Under the collective bargaining agreement, after an appeal to the University President plaintiff was permitted to file a grievance with the Union, though the Union was not obligated to arbitrate the case. Plaintiff, however, did not file a grievance after his appeal was denied. In granting summary judgment in favor of the University defendants on plaintiff’s due process claim, the court found that the procedures outlined in the collective bargaining agreement provided an adequate post-deprivation opportunity to be heard and that plaintiff had not otherwise identified any necessary additional procedural safeguards.   

    Topics:

    Collective Bargaining | Constitutional Issues | Due Process | Faculty & Staff

  • Date:

    Medina v. Univ. of Utah (10th Cir. Oct. 19, 2023)

    Order and Judgment affirming dismissal. Plaintiff, the director of BioKids, the University of Utah School of Biological Sciences (SBS) childcare center, brought procedural due process, contract, and state-law retaliation claims against the SBS Director and the University after her employment was (1) terminated through a Reduction in Force (RIF) when the School transferred management of BioKids to the University’s Center for Child & Family Resources as operational needs changed during the coronavirus pandemic, and then (2) reinstated when the arrangement expired. In affirming summary judgment in favor of the University, the Tenth Circuit held that plaintiff waived her procedural due process claim by not exercising her appeal rights under the University’s RIF policy. Her breach of contract claim failed because the RIF policy under which she was terminated was itself a part of her employment contract with the University. Her state-law retaliation claim failed because (1) rather than expressing concern that a planned expansion in BioKids’ capacity would violate state licensing requirements she succeeded in securing a variance from the Utah Department of Health to maintain the center’s compliance, and (2) she pointed to no evidence suggesting that she made a good faith report to the University that she anticipated any regulatory violation.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Contracts | Due Process | Employment Separation, RIFs, ERIPs & Retrenchment | Faculty & Staff

  • Date:

    Florance v. Barnett (7th Cir. Oct. 25, 2023)

    Order affirming dismissal. Plaintiff, a former Indiana University School of Medicine student, brought due process claims against multiple University officials related to student loan collections. Plaintiff took a student loan through a program administered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). Later, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), rated him as having a permanent and total disability. As he appeared to be gainfully employed and did not meet the statutory requirements for cancelation, the University declined to recommend cancelation of the loan and initiated collections proceedings against him. After plaintiff disputed HHS’s initial denial of his request for cancelation, HHS canceled his loan, and the University dismissed the collections case. In affirming dismissal of plaintiff’s claims, the Seventh Circuit held that he did not have a protected interest in loan cancellation since under the HHS loan program whether a borrower qualifies for cancelation due to a disability is a discretionary determination left to HHS, not an entitlement determined by the VA’s disability rating.   

    Topics:

    Constitutional Issues | Disability Discrimination | Discrimination, Accommodation, & Diversity | Due Process | Financial Aid, Scholarships, & Student Loans | Students

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