Burdine v. Greenville Technical Coll.
| Decision Date | 16 December 2010 |
| Docket Number | C.A. No. 6:08-cv-03764-JMC |
| Parties | Orrie D. Burdine, Plaintiff, v. Greenville Technical College, Lydia Dunaway, Steve Valand, and Edward Holman, Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — District of South Carolina |
Plaintiff brings this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981 and 1983 and the South Carolina Whistleblower's Act, S.C. Code Ann. § 8-27-10 (2009), alleging race discrimination and retaliation in the workplace, respectively. This matter is before the court on the Magistrate Judge's Report and Recommendation [Doc. # 50], filed on April 15, 2010, in which she recommends that Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment [Doc. # 31] and Defendants' Motion in Limine [Doc. # 39] be granted.
Plaintiff was apprised of her right to file objections to the Report and Recommendation and has done so in a memorandum filed on May 3, 2010. [Doc. # 51]. Plaintiff primarily argues that despite the lack of direct evidence in this case, a reasonable jury could conclude that Defendants' explanations are not credible and that racial discrimination at least partially motivated Defendants' alleged adverse employment actions.
For the reasons stated herein, Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment is granted, the Motion in Limine is granted, the Magistrate Judge's Report and Recommendation is adopted as stated herein, and this case is dismissed with prejudice.
The Magistrate Judge makes her Report and Recommendation in accordance with 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1) and Local Civil Rule 73.02 for the District of South Carolina. A Magistrate Judge makes only a recommendation to this court. The recommendation has no presumptive weight. The responsibility to make a final determination remains with this court. See Mathews v. Weber, 423 U.S. 261, 270-71 (1976). The court makes a de novo determination of those portions of the Report and Recommendation to which specific objection is made, and the court may accept, reject, or modify, in whole or in part, the recommendation of the Magistrate Judge or recommit the matter with instructions. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1).
Plaintiffbegan her employment with Defendant Greenville Technical College in March 1991. She was hired as a full-time instructor and her duties included lecturing, teaching and advising students. It appears that Plaintiff's work had been satisfactory, until the events that are the subject of this lawsuit began to unfold.
Between 2002 and 2003, Plaintiff became the department head of the Surgical Technology Program. Plaintiff was the only African-American department head in the Health Sciences and Nursing Division and the only African-American in the Surgical Technology Department. As department head, Plaintiff was responsible for Department operations, policy and procedure implementation, and student record maintenance. She was also responsible for curriculum development, syllabi, faculty supervision, teaching, advising, budget development, maintenance of accreditation records, working with affiliated agencies, and community coordinating. Generally, Defendant Greenville Technical College ("Greenville Tech") determines which faculty members will perform department head duties on an annual basis.
In 2006, Defendant Lydia Dunaway ("Dunaway") became Plaintiff's supervisor. Plaintiff had previously reported to Dean Gayle Heller and had worked under Heller without incident. It appears that the incidents relevant to Plaintiff's claims began on or about October 6 or October 9, 2006, when members of Plaintiff's Department began to have concerns about the falsification of student records.
During this time, Dunaway received three student behavior characteristic evaluations that Plaintiff completed. The evaluations contained handwritten observations relative to these students' performance in the Surgical Technology Program. The three particular students were not enrolled in the Program, however, because two of the students had never attended and one had dropped the class. Although Plaintiff admits that she completed the evaluations of students not enrolled in the Program, she maintains that the falsification was an accident and that she did not do so intentionally or with malice. Plaintiff describes the process of completing these forms as routine, except for those students with behavioral issues who required additional comments. In this particular batch ofevaluations, Plaintiff had only identified two students with behavioral issues and had separately completed those evaluations. Plaintiff filled out all of the other evaluations, including those for the students no longer enrolled, with identical ratings and comments. Plaintiff then exchanged her set of forms with Joyce Moyer ("Moyer") for Moyer's review.
Plaintiff and Moyer had worked together in the same Department for nine years, and Plaintiff contends that they had a good working relationship. According to Plaintiff, instead of calling the discrepancies to Plaintiff's attention, Moyer took the faulty evaluations directly to Dunaway, who presented them to then Human Resources Director Gregg Cann ("Cann"). Cann, Dunaway and Plaintiff met to discuss the alleged records falsification, and the incident was later dismissed. However, the incident was later included as part of Defendants' Corrective Action Plan.
Plaintiff asserts that Defendants ignored a similar infraction in which Moyer allegedly signed documents using the initials "CST"2 after her name during periods when her certification had lapsed. Plaintiff contends that Defendants had knowledge of this lapse because Greenville Tech paid for Moyer's recertification each year. In response to the infraction, Defendants simply placed an objective in Moyer's annual performance appraisal in which Moyer was to achieve recertification that year. Plaintiff does not argue that greater or additional discipline was necessary; instead, she claims that Moyer's act was more egregious than Plaintiff's alleged falsification of the evaluations.
Plaintiff alleges that her oversight concerning the evaluations was followed with a series of other instances in which Moyer informed Dunaway about allegedly minor or trivial problems concerning Plaintiff without Plaintiff's knowledge. As a result of these acts, on October 25, 2006, Plaintiff wrote a letter to Dean Heller seeking his help in resolving the difficulties that she washaving with Moyer and Dunaway. Plaintiff alleges that Dunaway and Moyer's campaign against her continued until Plaintiff's meeting with Cann on May 17, 2007. In 2007, Plaintiff received excellent student appraisals, but Dunaway gave her a critical employee appraisal. Plaintiff responded by submitting a rebuttal in which she alleged that Dunaway's appraisal was made in retaliation against her for defending herself against Dunaway's earlier allegations. Plaintiff contends that Greenville Tech undertook no investigation at that point. Furthermore, Plaintiff alleges that Dunaway refused to approve a trip for Plaintiff to examine a program at another technical college. Despite Dunaway's refusal, Plaintiff went anyway on her day off and at her own expense. As a result, Dunaway criticized Plaintiff for not taking Moyer with her.
Plaintiff contends that a series of other minor events continued during the fall term of 2007. Also during that term, Moyer resigned and went to work as head of the Surgical Technology Department at Tri-County Technical College. Thereafter, in November 2007, a majority of students in the Program submitted a petition expressing serious concern regarding Plaintiff's leadership of the Department and concern over her competency as an instructor. Plaintiff believes that other faculty members solicited students to sign the petition against her. Plaintiff informed Curtis Harkness, Greenville Tech's Vice President for Administration and Diversity, of this belief. Additionally, on December 3, 2007, several of Plaintiff's students submitted a reply petition on Plaintiff's behalf, which Plaintiff contends was not included in any of the college's evaluations of her job performance. On November 28, 2007, Plaintiff attempted to file a grievance against Dunaway and Moyer because of their treatment of her, but by her own admission she failed to properly file the grievance.
In November 2007, the faculty members unanimously gave Plaintiff a vote ofno confidence.
On November 30, 2007, Plaintiff met with Cann, Dean Heller, and Edward Holman ("Holman"), who was to replace Cann, to discuss Plaintiff's general accusations. Shortly after this meeting, Dean Heller retired, and Cann resigned. Around this same time, students enrolled in the Program were required to pass a certification examination. Plaintiff instructed these students, and apparently only a few of Plaintiff's students passed the examination.
It is undisputed that on December 13, 2007, Dunaway and Holman, the Interim Director of Human Resources, met with Plaintiff and presented a sixty (60) day Corrective Action Plan. The Corrective Action Plan included an instruction that Plaintiff review and update the Department's strategic plan, work on academic preparedness, and work on communication with Department faculty, staff, and students. Plaintiff submitted a rebuttal to the Corrective Action Plan on December 17, 2007, but Plaintiff avers that Defendants did not investigate the claims contained in her rebuttal. Nevertheless, at the end of that period, Defendants believed that Plaintiff had not shown improvement in the areas outlined.
On March 13, 2008, in response to Plaintiff's alleged failure to show improvement, Defendants issued Plaintiff a written Warning Notice of Substandard Performance. The warning required Plaintiff to improve in the following areas: (1) curriculum/course development; (2) teaching performance/instructor job duties; (3) supervision of faculty; (4) student advisement; and (5) professional development.
On April 11, 2008, Plaintiff...
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