Gillespie v. BD. OF ED. OF N. LITTLE ROCK, ETC.
| Citation | 528 F. Supp. 433 |
| Decision Date | 08 December 1981 |
| Docket Number | No. LR-C-80-364.,LR-C-80-364. |
| Parties | Barbara GILLESPIE, Plaintiff, v. The BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the NORTH LITTLE ROCK SCHOOL DISTRICT, NUMBER ONE OF PULASKI COUNTY, Mary A. Gosser As President and Representative of said Board; and George Miller, Superintendent of Schools of said School District, Defendants. |
| Court | United States District Courts. 8th Circuit. United States State District Court of Eastern District of Arkansas |
John W. Walker, Little Rock, Ark., for plaintiff.
Robert V. Light, Little Rock, Ark., for defendants.
1. The plaintiff is a certified secondary guidance counselor with a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology from Henderson State Teachers College and a 1972 Master's degree in her field from the University of Arkansas.
2. Prior to her employment with the North Little Rock School District, plaintiff was last employed by the Pulaski County School District. She was not totally happy in this district and in July, 1979 through a friend secured an introduction to Mr. George Miller, Superintendent of the schools in the North Little Rock District, and made application for a counselor's position in the latter district.
3. In September, 1979 a vacancy occurred on the guidance counselor staff at Ridgeroad Junior High School. Plaintiff was contacted and interviewed by Ken Brooks, Director of Secondary Education. A day or two later she was interviewed by John Mears, Principal of Ridgeroad Junior High School.
4. After she resigned from the Pulaski County School District, plaintiff was offered and accepted a position as one of the two guidance counselors at Ridgeroad Junior High School for the 1979-80 school year.
5. At the time of her interviews with Brooks and Mears, plaintiff had been pregnant between four and five months. She did not disclose this fact to either of them because, as stated in her deposition, "I wanted to be able to prove myself before it was made known so that they could see what kind of a job that I could do without taking that much in." Her interviewers did not know that she was pregnant at the time they recommended her employment.
6. Approximately a week after reporting for her job assignment, she notified her principal Mears that she was pregnant and would require maternity leave.
7. Plaintiff was granted maternity leave by the District, which began on January 11, 1980.
8. On the same day that plaintiff's maternity leave began, she filed a claim with the Arkansas Employment Security Division. To qualify for benefits under the Arkansas Act, plaintiff must not only be unemployed but must also be available for work. Mrs. Gillespie was neither. She signed a form stating that she had quit her work, was unemployed and was available for work, all of which was false. She was actually on maternity leave toward which she had accumulated 16½ days of paid leave time. Mrs. Gillespie states that she did not realize the import of these declarations and was not familiar with the provisions of the Arkansas Employment Security Act. It is difficult for the Court to believe that a woman with a Master's degree in guidance counseling would not know that, to draw unemployment benefits, a claimant has to be unemployed and available for work. We find that plaintiff, with full knowledge, made application for unemployment benefits to which she was not entitled.
9. When Doyle Crownover, the Assistant Superintendent for Administration, received a copy of plaintiff's unemployment compensation claim, he wrote her a letter dated January 18, 1980 in which he expressed surprise that she had quit her job and that a replacement would have to be found.
10. Immediately upon receiving this letter, plaintiff went to see Crownover and advised that the unemployment claim was a "mistake" and that she would drop the claim. She subsequently did drop the claim.
11. Plaintiff in her testimony at the instant hearing related a bizarre version of her conversation with Crownover concerning her unemployment claim. She stated that Crownover asked if she wanted her job badly enough to sleep with her principal, or with Brooks, or with him. She stated that she refused each proposal. She also testified that Crownover asked her if the baby was Mr. Miller's. The Court finds that this version of her conversation with Crownover is a complete fabrication. In her deposition taken on October 15, 1980 she was questioned in great detail about the January conversation with Crownover. Her version at that time was that it related solely to the unemployment claim. After a number of questions by defense counsel about this aspect of their conversation, she was asked if "that was all that passed between the two of you all in that meeting." She replied that "this was the gist of the whole conversation." (Pl. Dep. p. 29; DX 28.) When asked why she had not related this conversation before, she stated that she had related it in a hearing on a motion for a preliminary injunction before the Court on December 10, 1980. My recollection was to the contrary. I have now gone over the tape of the hearing with my court reporter and find nothing in her testimony remotely resembling such a proposal on the part of Mr. Crownover. On cross examination she stated that the first person she told about Crownover's alleged proposal was her husband in February, 1981. Of course, she had already testified on direct examination that she had related it in the preliminary injunction hearing on December 10, 1980. We prefer to believe that Mrs. Gillespie did not deliberately commit perjury. She has been under psychiatric care for the last year, and in our view the conversation with Crownover as now related by her is the fictional product of a troubled emotional state. In fact she stated that she did not recall this part of the conversation at all until about a year after it happened.
12. On March 6, 1980 the plaintiff filed a completed questionnaire sent to all employees to assist the District in planning for the 1980-81 school year. In this questionnaire she stated that she was not interested in an administrative, supervisory, or other position which would represent an advancement in salary.
13. Plaintiff ended her maternity leave in the middle of March, 1980 and returned to work.
14. Plaintiff was advised on or about April 3, 1980 by Mears that, due to declining enrollment, her position as guidance counselor was being abolished for the 1980-81 school year.
15. On April 10, 1980 plaintiff and her husband met with Brooks to discuss her future with the District.
16. At the April 10, 1980 meeting Brooks confirmed that, due to declining enrollment, the position of counselor at Ridgeroad Junior High School would have to be abolished. However, at this same meeting Brooks advised the plaintiff that she would be reassigned as a classroom teacher for the 1980-81 academic year.
17. At a regularly scheduled school board meeting held April 17, 1980, the District, by a majority vote of the school board, agreed to employ plaintiff as a classroom teacher for the 1980-81 academic year.
18. On April 21, 1980 by letter addressed to Brooks, plaintiff confirmed the April 10, 1980 meeting with him and advised Brooks that although she understood that she would be reassigned as a classroom teacher, she still was interested in a counseling position if one became available. (PX 6.)
19. Through error in the programming of the computer, a counseling position contract dated May 23, 1980 was prepared in plaintiff's name. (PX 1.)
20. Under cover of a form letter dated May 23, 1980 from Crownover (PX 8), the erroneous counselor's contract was forwarded to the plaintiff at her school. She immediately executed this contract and placed it in a tray in her school office used to transmit material to the District's administrative offices.
21. As soon as he became aware of the mistake, Crownover, by letter dated May 27, 1980, advised the plaintiff that the contract for the counselor's position had been prepared erroneously. (PX 2.) He enclosed a contract (PX 15) corrected to substitute classroom teacher for counselor as the subject position. He requested that she execute the corrected contract and return the erroneous contract.
22. On June 6, 1980 plaintiff sent Crownover a letter returning the corrected contract unexecuted and stating that she intended to assert her rights under the counselor contract.
23. Plaintiff's salary under the erroneous counselor contract would have been $16,043.28. Plaintiff's salary under the classroom teacher contract sent by Mr. Crownover with his May 27, 1980 letter would have been $14,439.00. The pay differential results because a counselor works ten months and a teacher nine months. The pay rate is the same. At the time plaintiff received the counselor contract, dated May 23, 1980, she knew or should have known that a mistake had been made and that the District had intended to employ her as a secondary teacher and not a counselor.
24. Plaintiff's refusal to return the May 23, 1980 counselor contract and her refusal to execute the May 27, 1980 secondary teacher contract were attempts to take advantage of a clerical computer error.
25. Mr. George E. Miller wrote plaintiff on June 26, 1980 and notified her that, because of her attempt to take advantage of the error in the preparation of the 1980-81 contract, he would recommend at the July 24, 1980 school board meeting that the North Little Rock School Board "terminate" any contractual relationship existing with the plaintiff.
26. On July 25, 1980 by certified mail, Mr. Miller notified the plaintiff that she had been "terminated" by the board at the meeting referred to above.
27. The following is a recapitulation of applicants and new hires for positions in the North Little Rock School District listed by sex:
APPLICANTS
TOTALS
1977 Male 21
Female 116 137
1978 Male 144
Female 420 564
1979 Male...To continue reading
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...showing a pattern of promotions favoring males (who tend to acquire more uninterrupted seniority). Gillespie v. Bd. of Ed. of North Little Rock, 528 F.Supp. 433, 437 (E.D.Ark.1981), aff'd., 692 F.2d 529 (8th Cir.1982). Cf. Haskins v. Sec. of HHS, 35 FEP Cas. 256 (W.D.Mo.1984) (sustaining cl......
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...has recognized that the mere issuance of a contract did not control in an analogous situation. See Gillespie v. Board of Education of North Little Rock, 528 F.Supp. 433 (E.D.Ark.1981), affirmed 692 F.2d 529 (8th Cir.1982). In Gillespie, a guidance counselor for the school was mistakenly iss......
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Gillespie v. Board of Educ. of North Little Rock School Dist., No. One of Pulaski County, 82-1040
...District) substantially complied with the notice provisions of Ark.Stat.Ann. Sec. 80-1304(b) (1980). We affirm the district court, 528 F.Supp. 433. I. Gillespie, a certified guidance counselor, applied for and received a position as one of the two guidance counselors at Ridgeroad Junior Hig......
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Morton v. Hampton School Dist. No. 1, CA
...Board of Regents of State Colleges v. Roth, 408 U.S. 564, 92 S.Ct. 2701, 33 L.Ed.2d 548 (1972), and Gillespie v. Board of Education of North Little Rock, 528 F.Supp. 433 (E.D.Ark.1981). CRACRAFT, C.J., and CORBIN, J., agree. ...