James v. Cleveland Sch. Dist.
| Decision Date | 30 July 2021 |
| Docket Number | 4:19-CV-66-DMB-RP |
| Parties | OLECIA JAMES PLAINTIFF v. THE CLEVELAND SCHOOL DISTRICT, et al. DEFENDANTS |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Mississippi |
Olecia James tied for third place in the academic rankings of the 2018 graduating class of Cleveland Central High School. Claiming that she would have been class salutatorian but for violations of her equal protection and due process rights James sued the Cleveland School District, its superintendent and various School District officials seeking monetary injunctive, and declaratory relief. The defendants have moved for summary judgment on all of James' claims. Because James cannot establish a violation of her constitutional rights, summary judgment will be granted.
A court shall enter summary judgment if "there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a). "An issue is genuine if the evidence is such that a reasonable factfinder could return a verdict for the nonmoving party." Jones v. United States, 936 F.3d 318, 321 (5th Cir. 2019) (cleaned up).
The "party seeking summary judgment always bears the initial responsibility of demonstrating the absence of a genuine issue of material fact." Id. (alterations omitted). When the movant would not bear the burden of persuasion at trial, he may satisfy his initial summary judgment burden "by pointing out that the record contains no support for the non-moving party's claim." Wease v. Ocwen Loan Servicing, L.L.C., 915 F.3d 987, 997 (5th Cir. 2019). If the moving party satisfies his initial burden, the nonmovant "must go beyond the pleadings and designate specific facts showing that there is a genuine issue for trial." Jones, 936 F.3d at 321 (cleaned up).
For more than fifty years, the Cleveland School District in Cleveland, Mississippi, has operated under a desegregation order issued in Cowan v. Bolivar County Board of Education, which enjoins the School District from discriminating based on race or color.[2]
Beginning in 1989, students in the School District attended schools based on court-ordered attendance zones with a majority-to-minority transfer policy.[3] The School District operated two middle schools-D.M. Smith Middle School and Margaret Green Junior High-and two high schools-Cleveland High School and East Side High School. Doc. #185-15 at¶¶2, 5; Doc #185-16 at 89.
In May 2011, the United States of America, citing the enrollment statistics at D.M. Smith and East Side, filed a motion in Cowan to compel the School District to desegregate its schools.[4]Finding that the School District had "attempted" to comply with various desegregation orders but failed to desegregate its middle schools and high schools, United States District Judge Glen Davidson directed the School District to propose a desegregation plan.[5] The School District proposed a plan which would place certain high-level academic offerings at East Side and D.M. Smith for the purpose of drawing white students to those schools.[6] The United States sought consolidation of the schools.[7]
In January 2013, Judge Davidson rejected both proposals and modified the desegregation order in Cowan to permit "any child within the District to enroll in either of the high schools or junior high schools, regardless of the racial composition of the student body at such schools."[8]Following Judge Davidson's order, the School District maintained a policy of "open enrollment" under which students could choose the middle schools and high schools they attended. Doc. #185-4 at 6-7. Under this open enrollment policy, East Side and D.M. Smith maintained almost exclusively African American enrollments.[9] Margaret Green and Cleveland High each maintained enrollments of approximately half white and approximately half minority.[10]
On May 13, 2016, this Court, finding that East Side and D.M. Smith were single-race schools due to past segregation, directed the School District to consolidate the middle schools and consolidate the high schools. See Cowan v. Bolivar Cnty Bd. o/Educ, 186 F.Supp.3d 564, 620-21 (N.D. Miss. 2016). Beginning with the 2017-2018 academic year, the School District consolidated the high schools into a single high school, Cleveland Central High School. Doc. #193-5 at 1. The facts of this case concern the assignment of course quality points for courses taken at the high schools and middle schools prior to consolidation.
Pursuant to state law, "[t]he Mississippi Department of Education ... provide[s] curriculum frameworks to set forth expectations of students by specifying course titles and content." 7 Miss. Admin. Code Pt. 3, R. 28.1. Consistent with this responsibility, the Department of Education provides an annual 7 Miss. Admin. Code Pt. 3, R. 28.2. However, individual school districts may "implement[] innovative programs authorized by the State Board of Education." Id. The approved courses are assigned a six-digit course code. See Doc. #230-19 at PagelD 7011.
According to the Department of Education's graduation requirements:
Contents of each required and elective course must include the core objectives identified in the Mississippi College- and Career-Readiness Standards. Course titles and identification numbers must appear in the current edition of the Approved Courses for Secondary Schools of Mississippi.
Doc. #241-9 at PagelD 7534. The Department of Education further requires that "[s]chools seeking approval to offer a course not listed in the Approved Courses for the Secondary Schools of Mississippi must complete the course development process." Doc. #241-10.
Each academic year, a group of teachers, principals, and administrators in the School District submit to the School District's School Board a proposed curriculum guide for that academic year. Doc. #185-14 at 19-20. The curriculum guide lists, among other things, the classes to be offered in the School District that year, designates the classes as Accelerated, Advanced, or Regular, and provides the standards for determining class ranks and class awards. Doc. #230-7 at PagelD 6834-35. The School Board then approves the guide. See Doc. #185-16 at 6.
The standards set forth in the curriculum guides are to be controlling within the School District. Doc. #232-1 at 66. But according to former Assistant Superintendent Lisa Bramuchi, in preparing the curriculum guide, "[s]ome classes that were always advanced or accelerated might have been left off." Doc. #185-14 at 41-42. In such circumstances, those courses "continued to be whatever they were." Id.
It does not appear that the School District offered training regarding course designation. See Doc. #185-14 at 53-54. Bramuchi testified that it is Id.
To assist with school administration and specifically grade calculation, the School District contracts with the company Central Access to maintain the SAM Spectra managing system. Doc. #232-12 at 10-12. "SAM Spectra is a managing system that [assists] Mississippi school districts to manage enrollment, attendance, grading, scheduling, discipline, special education, state reporting, calendars, dashboards, a parent portal, a student portal, iOS apps, etc." Doc. #185-4 at ¶ 5. With respect to grading, Central Access receives information from a school district on "how ... GPA [Grade Point Average] and QPA [Quality Point Average] should be calculated" and then Central Access "create[s] the grade scripts for them." Doc. #232-12 at 17. "QPA reflects a student's weighted grade point average on a 6 point scale taking into account any advanced placement credit...." Doc. #185-4 at ¶ 6. "GPA reflects only grades on a 4 point scale ...." Id.
Course information in SAM Spectra carries over from year to year such that if a course was listed as Accelerated one year and Regular in another, the change would have to be made manually. Doc. #232-12 at 53. In this respect, while the grade scripts in SAM Spectra are produced automatically, a person with access to SAM Spectra may manually manipulate the quality points on a student's transcript. Id. at 30. In the School District, administrators, principals, and counselors had access to grade scripts in the SAM Spectra system. Doc. #231-6 at 49.
SAM Spectra also assists the School District with meeting state reporting requirements through the Mississippi Student Information System ("MSIS"). See Doc. #185-19 at 144. The data for MSIS is "pull[ed] from SAMS." Id. Additionally, the School District maintains course detail reports listing the courses offered at each of the schools in the School District. See Docs. #230-11, #230-12, #230-13. The course detail reports are pulled from the information in the Central Access system. Doc. #232-12 at 76-77.
The School Board delegated responsibility for ensuring the accuracy of SAM/MSIS systems to Jacqueline Thigpen, the School District superintendent. Doc. #231-2 at 90; Doc. #231 at 116. Thigpen, in turn, delegated this authority to the MSIS/SAM coordinator and to an assistant superintendent.[11] Doc. #231 at 117; Doc. #231-2 at 91.[12] However, the superintendent cannot change the curriculum guide...
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