Cases & Developments

Opinion Reversing and Remanding the District Court’s dismissal order. Plaintiff, a math professor at Truckee Meadows Community College, brought claims in district court against the College and the Nevada System of Higher Education administrators
alleging retaliation and violation of due process and equal protection after he voiced concerns about a policy change to the math curriculum. After being cut off during the Q&A of a Math Summit on the co-requisite policy implementation, plaintiff
printed off and distributed a handout discussing his concerns with the new policy. Plaintiff was instructed not to distribute the handout but did so anyways, and alleges he was accused of disobeying his superior as well as being accused of being a bully,
that his conduct was disruptive, and that he made an error by defying his superior. Plaintiff contends he was pressured to resign from his position as chair and member of another professor’s tenure committee. Additionally, issues were then raised
with plaintiff’s syllabus policies, though they had not changed in many years and mirrored that of other professors in the department. Plaintiff’s performance evaluations went from “excellent” to “unsatisfactory” detailing
that he exhibited “insubordination.” Following consecutive “unsatisfactory” performance evaluations, plaintiff was given a disciplinary hearing, and then, a termination hearing. Plaintiff alleged the hearing did not conform to
the procedures outlined in the College handbook, though he was not terminated, and no additional disciplinary measures resulted from the hearing. In his original complaint, plaintiff alleged (1) his criticism of the changes in the college mathematics
curriculum addressed a matter of public concern; (2) the speech was not barred from First Amendment protection as it related to scholarship and teaching; (3) the adverse employment actions he experienced were motivated, at least in part, by his speech;
and (4) defendants had not made a showing of “actual material and substantial disruption” or “reasonable predictions of disruption” to support their adverse employment actions against plaintiff. The district court dismissed plaintiff’s
First Amendment retaliation claim, holding that the administrators in their official capacities were protected by Eleventh Amendment sovereign immunity. However, the Ninth Circuit, in reversing the district court’s decision, held that plaintiff
had the right to speak out about the math standards, the standards were a matter of public concern and comfortably fit within the scholarship or teaching exception, and the administrators are not entitled to dismissal on qualified immunity grounds, thus
allowing plaintiff the opportunity to seek leave to amend his claims.