Beck v. Manhattan Coll.

• Decision Date: 07 May 2021
• Docket Number: 20 Civ. 3229 (XLS)
• Citation: 537 F.Supp.3d 584
• Parties: Czigany BECK, individually and on behalf of others similarly situated, Plaintiff, v. MANHATTAN COLLEGE, Defendant.
• Court: U.S. District Court — Southern District of New York

537 F.Supp.3d 584

Czigany BECK, individually and on behalf of others similarly situated, Plaintiff,

v.MANHATTAN COLLEGE, Defendant.

20 Civ. 3229 (XLS)

United States District Court, S.D. New York.

Signed May 7, 2021

Eric Poulin, Roy T. Willey, IV, Blake G. Abbott, Anastopoulo Law Firm, LLC, Charleston, SC, Edward G. Toptani, Toptani Law Offices, New York, NY, for Plaintiff.

Gregory Bertram Reilly, III, Aisling Margaret McAllister, Samuel G. Dobre, Bond, Schoenek & King, New York, NY, for Defendant.

OPINION & ORDER

LOUIS L. STANTON, U.S.D.J.

Defendant Manhattan College moves to dismiss plaintiff Czigany Beck's first amended complaint ("FAC")(Dkt. No. 21) under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 12(c).

For the following reasons, the motion (Dkt. No. 27) is granted in part, dismissing Beck's breach of contract, conversion, and consumer protection claims, and her unjust enrichment claim for a fee refund, and denied as to her unjust enrichment claim for a tuition refund.

BACKGROUND¹

Czigany Beck enrolled at, and paid tuition and fees to, Manhattan College for the Spring 2020 academic semester. The semester began with the first day of classes on or about January 14, 2020 and was scheduled to conclude in mid-May.

When the COVID-19 pandemic reached New York in March of 2020, the College moved all classes online, cancelled all on-campus events, closed most campus facilities, and required most students living on campus to vacate the residence halls.

Ms. Beck brought this putative class action claiming that the College breached its contractual obligation to provide students with in-person instruction and access to on-campus activities, services, and facilities in exchange for tuition and fees.² She seeks a pro rata refund for the difference in fair market value between what the students contracted for and what they received. She also brings claims for unjust enrichment, conversion, and violation of Sections 349 and 350 of the New York General Business Law, which bar deceptive trade practices and false advertising.

DISCUSSION

Breach of Contract

Ms. Beck alleges two distinct breach of contract claims. Both allege that the College breached its promise to provide in-person instruction and access to campus facilities and services by moving classes online and suspending or vastly reducing access to those campus facilities and services. They differ in that one claim alleges that the College made those promises in exchange for tuition, while the other alleges that the College made those promises in exchange for fees.

"Under New York law, an implied contract is formed when a university accepts a student for enrollment." Papelino v. Albany Coll. of Pharmacy of Union Univ., 633 F.3d 81, 93 (2d Cir. 2011) (citing Carr v. St. John's Univ., 17 A.D.2d 632, 633, 231 N.Y.S.2d 410 (2d Dep't), aff'd, 12 N.Y.2d 802, 187 N.E.2d 18, 235 N.Y.S.2d 834 (1962) ). "The rights and obligations of the parties as contained in the university's bulletins, circulars and regulations made available to the student, become a part of this contract." Vought v. Teachers Coll., Columbia Univ., 127 A.D.2d 654, 654, 511 N.Y.S.2d 880, 881 (2d Dep't 1987). "To state a claim for breach of this implied contract, ‘a student must identify specifically designated and discrete promises.’ " Goldberg, 535 F.Supp.3d at 193 (quoting Nungesser v. Columbia Univ., 169 F. Supp. 3d 353, 370 (S.D.N. Y 2016) ).

The Tuition Claim

The FAC recites statements from the College's website to support Ms. Beck's contention that the College promised in-person classes and access to specific on-campus facilities and services. See FAC ¶¶ 22 (advertising the College's campus and its New York City location), 64 (stating that the College offers "a catalog of courses that use New York City as a classroom"), 69 ("At Manhattan, you will have the chance to make learning come alive through a variety of immersive, hands-on experiences in New York City and beyond."), 70 ("Our beautiful campus offers a serene escape from city life with easy access to the culture and opportunities of midtown Manhattan.").

These statements are not specific enough to promise in-person classes or access to specific on-campus facilities or services. They merely advertise and describe the experience of studying and living on the College's New York City campus.

The rest of the website excerpts in the FAC fare no better. For instance, ¶ 68 includes the statement "We offer more than 100 majors, minors, graduate programs and advanced certificates, as well as degrees that can be earned fully online or combined with a traditional classroom experience." That sentence promotes the variety of courses and programs the College offers, including "traditional" (i.e. in-person) classes; it does not promise in-person instruction. ¶ 71 advertises some of the activities available for those who live on campus -- "from spending sunny afternoons studying on the Quad with your roommates, to grabbing a late-night bite to eat in Locke's Loft after a basketball game." It does not promise access to those activities. And ¶ 72 recites statistics the College uses in its marketing, including that "75% of freshman live on campus." Not only does that not promise students on-campus residence, but Ms. Beck does not allege that she lived on campus before the Covid-related closures.

Ms. Beck similarly cannot derive an implied promise to hold in-person classes -- whether from general educational customs, course attendance requirements, the College offering Ms. Beck's classes in person before March 2020, or the College's 30% discount of tuition for its online summer 2020 session — as none of these circumstances amount to a written promise to provide specified services. See In re Columbia, 523 F.Supp.3d at 523–24 (citing Ford, 507 F.Supp.3d at 414-15 ) (finding that neither "the fact that Columbia provided in-person instruction in Plaintiffs’ courses before March 2020" nor "the references to classroom locations and physical attendance requirements in Columbia's syllabi, departmental policies and handbooks, and course registration portal" imply a contractual entitlement to in-person classes); Hassan, 515 F.Supp.3d at 86 (quoting Gertler v. Goodgold, 107 A.D.2d 481, 485, 487 N.Y.S.2d 565, 568 (1st Dep't), aff'd, 66 N.Y.2d 946, 489 N.E.2d 748, 498 N.Y.S.2d 779 (1985) ) ("In addition, a university's Academic and administrative prerogatives’ are not. ‘impliedly limited by custom, or by a strained theory of contractual construction.’ ").

Ms. Beck contends that the law of contracts is not so demanding:

Defendant argues that Plaintiff cannot prevail because she "cannot identify any specific promise of on-campus instruction (even in the face of a pandemic and state-mandated shutdown)." Def. Mem. [ECF 28] at pg. 6. However, the law with respect to contract formation does not require this absurd level of specificity.

Pl.’s Opp'n at 7.

But a promise must be written and specific for that promise to be enforced as a term of the implied educational contract between student and university. See Ford, 507 F.Supp.3d at 414 (requiring that "breach of contract actions between a student and a school must be grounded in a text"); In re Columbia, 523 F.Supp.3d at 421 (alterations in original) ("In general, to sustain a contract claim against a university, a student must point to a provision that guarantees ‘certain specified services,’ Baldridge v. State, 293 A.D.2d 941, 740 N.Y.S.2d 723, 725 (3d Dep't 2002) (quoting Paladino v. Adelphi Univ., 89 A.D.2d 85, 454 N.Y.S.2d 868, 873 (2d Dep't 1982) ), not merely to a ‘[g]eneral statement [ ] of policy,’ Keefe [v. New York Law School], 2009 WL 3858679, at *1 [(N.Y. Sup. 2009)], or to statements of ‘opinion or puffery,’ Bader v. Siegel, 238 A.D.2d 272, 657 N.Y.S.2d 28, 29 (1st Dep't 1997).").

Ms. Beck's claim that the College breached a contractual agreement to provide in-person instruction and access to campus facilities and services in exchange for tuition thus fails.

The Fees Claim

The FAC identifies only one specific fee, the Comprehensive Fee, which it claims "According to Defendant, the Comprehensive Fee charged is charged in order to cover the costs of things such as access to the Campus Health Center, student activities and services, athletics, etc." FAC ¶ 126. The College attaches to its Answer the "Fees Glossary" section of the "Tuition & Fees" page of its website, which describes the Comprehensive Fee as follows:

Full-time students are now assessed a Comprehensive Fee that includes a number of college services. The mandatory Comprehensive Fee is a per-semester fee. This general student fee replaces many of the separate charges previously billed (i.e., student engagement fee, health center fee, information services fee, etc.) and is nonrefundable.

Answer Ex. B at 3-4.

The breach of contract claim regarding fee payments is dismissed.

Unjust Enrichment

Ms. Beck claims that the College was unjustly enriched at the students’ expense when it moved to online instruction and closed on-campus services and facilities without refunding students a portion of their tuition and fees.

The College first contends that "Plaintiff's unjust enrichment claim must be dismissed because it is nothing more than a restatement of her breach of contract claims." Def.’s Mem. at 16.

Where an unjust enrichment claim duplicates a claim for breach of a valid, enforceable contractual obligation, the unjust enrichment claim must be dismissed.

However, if the subject-matter of an unjust enrichment claim "is not covered by a valid, enforceable contractual obligation," that claim is not duplicative and need not be dismissed based solely on the existence of a breach of contract claim. See, e.g., Spirit Locker, Inc. v. EVO Direct, LLC , 696 F. Supp. 2d 296, 305 (E.D.N.Y. 2010) (declining to dismiss unjust enrichment claim where contract did not cover subject of unjust enrichment claim).

Ford, 507 F.Supp.3d at 419.

Ms. Beck's unjust enrichment claim for a tuition refund of the difference in value...