Rolfe v. Baker Coll., 340158

• Decision Date: 07 May 2019
• Docket Number: No. 340158,340158
• Parties: NICHOLE ROLFE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. BAKER COLLEGE, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

NICHOLE ROLFE, Plaintiff-Appellant, v. BAKER COLLEGE, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 340158

STATE OF MICHIGAN COURT OF APPEALS

May 7, 2019

If this opinion indicates that it is "FOR PUBLICATION," it is subject to revision until final publication in the Michigan Appeals Reports.

UNPUBLISHED

Genesee Circuit Court

LC No. 15-104587-CK

Before: BOONSTRA, P.J., and METER and FORT HOOD, JJ.

PER CURIAM.

Plaintiff appeals the consent judgment entered by the trial court to the extent it limited her recoverable damages. We affirm.

I. PERTINENT FACTS AND PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Plaintiff was enrolled in defendant's nursing program. Approximately six months into her tenure as a student in defendant's program, plaintiff was subjected to discipline from defendant's nursing director. As part of that discipline, plaintiff signed a "behavior contract" that would permit her dismissal from defendant's program if she continued to demonstrate "improper professional behavior." Plaintiff was subsequently discharged from the program for violation of the behavior contract based on conduct that defendant characterized as "[d]isrupting the learning environment . . . by continuously arguing . . . about a personal belief regarding immunizations," "persistent, aggressive, oppositional behavior . . . by student in clinical group setting . . . disrupting the clinical learning environment," and "abrasive and unprofessional" email communications to an instructor.

Plaintiff filed suit, asserting breach of express or implied contract claims. In response to defendant's motion for summary disposition, plaintiff asserted that her damages included "future lost wages" based on the full wages of a professional midwife for 30 years, in the amount of $97,700 per year for 30 years; plaintiff calculated her total damages at over three million dollars. Defendant filed motions in limine seeking to restrict plaintiff's damages to the cost of the tuition she had paid to defendant, which according to defendant was at most $9,270.85. After several motion hearings, the trial court granted summary disposition in favor of defendant on most of plaintiff's claims, including her claim for breach of "the covenant of good faith and fair dealing,"¹ but denied summary disposition regarding plaintiff's claim for breach of the behavior contract. The trial court also issued an opinion and order limiting plaintiff's recoverable damages to "the cost of education," thereby excluding such other claimed damages as future lost wages, stating in relevant part:

Plaintiff may recover, if and when proven, the costs of her education in a sense broader than tuition and books but limited to what she actually paid. If she paid with borrowed funds, such funds are a measure of damages, so long as she is obligated to pay them back. To the extent she is not required to pay them back but she is precluded from obtaining additional funds (e.g. a one-time grant) her inability to reacquire funds to pay for an education elsewhere formulates an aspect of her damages.

Before trial, the parties stipulated to the entry of a final judgment in favor of plaintiff and against defendant with regard to plaintiff's claim that defendant had breached the behavior contract, and to the dismissal of plaintiff's other claims, with a stipulated damages amount of $15,000 plus a waiver of any remaining debt owed by plaintiff to defendant. The consent judgment reserved plaintiff's right to appeal the trial court's limitation of her damages.

This appeal followed.

II. LIMITATION ON DAMAGES

Plaintiff argues that the trial court erred by restricting her damages to the costs of her nursing school education. We disagree. The trial court's pre-judgment orders limiting plaintiff's damages were made in the context of a partial grant of summary disposition under MCR 2.116(C)(10), as well as the trial court's partial grant of defendant's motions in limine requesting limitation of damages.

A motion for summary disposition under MCR 2.116(C)(10) tests the factual sufficiency of the complaint. In reviewing a grant of summary disposition under MCR 2.116(C)(10), this Court considers the pleadings, admissions, and other evidence submitted by the parties in the light most favorable to the nonmoving party. Summary disposition is appropriate if there is no genuine issue of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. [Kendzierski v Macomb Co, 319 Mich App 278, 282; 901 NW2d 111 (2017) (citation omitted).]

This Court reviews for an abuse of discretion a trial court's decision to grant or deny a motion in limine. Bartlett v Sinai Hosp of Detroit, 149 Mich App 412, 418; 385 NW2d 801 (1986). A trial court is found to have abused its discretion when its decision falls outside the range of reasonable and principled outcomes. Maldonado v Ford Motor Co, 476 Mich 372, 388; 719 NW2d 809 (2006).

Plaintiff argues that the trial court erred by denying her the ability to recover damages for lost future wages and other damages not directly tied to the expense of her nursing education, including the expense of her pre-nursing program education. Plaintiff urges this Court to accept the reasoning of a Florida court in allowing an award of damages for breach of contract to reflect the loss of future educational, professional and wage earning opportunities. See Sharick v Southeastern Univ of Health Sciences, Inc, 780 So2d 136, 138 (Fla App, 2000) (Sharick I); Nova Southeastern Univ of the Health Sciences, Inc v Sharick (Following Remand), 21 So3d 41 (Fla App, 2009) (Sharick II). Plaintiff contends that she sufficiently demonstrated the likelihood of her successful completion of defendant's nursing program and of her progressing to higher educational achievements and professional employment, and that she established with reasonable certainty her claimed financial losses. We hold that the damages plaintiff seeks are not recoverable under Michigan law regarding breach of contract damages.

As recognized by this Court:

Damages are an element of a breach-of-contract claim. "The party asserting a breach of contract has the burden of proving its damages with reasonable certainty, and may recover only those damages that are the direct, natural, and proximate result of the breach." "[D]amages must not be conjectural or speculative in their nature, or dependent upon the chances of business or other contingencies. . . ." Although breach-of-contract damages need not be precisely established, "uncertainty as to the fact of the amount of damage caused by the breach of contract is fatal[.]" [Van Buren Charter Twp v Visteon Corp, 319 Mich App 538, 550-551; 904 NW2d 192 (2017), oral argument on the application gtd 501 Mich 1069 (2018) (citations omitted).]

Damages are speculative when "they do not arise from [a] purported breach of contract but depend entirely on the occurrence of multiple contingencies which might or might not occur at some point in the future." Id. at 553 (citation omitted). It is routinely recognized that "a plaintiff's remedy for breach of contract is limited to damages that arise naturally from the breach or those that were in the contemplation of the parties at the time the contract was made." See, e.g., Allison v AEW Capital Mgt, LLP, 481 Mich 419, 426 n 3; 751 NW2d 8 (2008) (emphasis added). The intended purpose underlying these concepts is to "place the nonbreaching party in as good a position as if the contract had been fully performed." Id. (citation omitted).

Plaintiff's argument appears to blur the lines between the damages compensable in a tort action and those for breach of contract. "A plaintiff cannot maintain an action in tort for nonperformance of a contract. There must be a separate and distinct duty imposed by law. An alleged bad-faith breach of a[] . . . contract does not state an independent tort claim." Casey v Auto Owners Ins Co, 273 Mich App 388, 401-402; 729 NW2d 277 (2006) (citations omitted). Plaintiff's complaint and amended complaint are very clear - all of her claims were identifiedsolely as various permutations of a breach of contract claim.² The claim that survived in the trial court, in the final order, was plaintiff's claim for breach of the behavior contract. Thus, plaintiff's damages are restricted to the type of claim pleaded - breach of an express contract. This Court has recognized, in the employment context, a distinction between tort and breach of contract damages with regard to the availability of "future lost wages." Hord v Environmental Research Institute of Mich, 228 Mich App 638, 643-644; 579 NW2d 133 (1998), remanded by 459 Mich 960 (1999), rev'd on other grounds after remand 463 Mich 399 (2000).

In this case, defendant's liability relates to a breach of the behavior contract. This contract related specifically to plaintiff's conduct following her enrollment in defendant's nursing program, bore a date of June 10, 2013, after plaintiff's acceptance into the program, and was to remain in effect for the "Duration of the Nursing Program." It also delineated that the failure of plaintiff to abide by the terms of the behavior contract could lead to "failure of the current courses" or "dismissal from the Baker College Nursing Program." It is difficult to construe how plaintiff's pre-nursing program academics or the failure to pursue her alleged later desired educational or professional pursuits comprise "damages that are the direct, natural and proximate result of the breach," Van Buren Charter Twp, 319 Mich at 550-551, or how these alleged past and future damages "were in the contemplation of the parties at the time the contract was made," Allison, 481 Mich at 426 n 3. The behavior contract arose solely in the context of plaintiff's current academic pursuit and had a definitive duration. There is no indication that the parties to the contract considered her anticipated future academic and professional career and earning capacity. Instead, the behavior contract is unambiguous in regard to the parameters it...