Opinion
Civil Action 2:21-01472-DCN-MGB
07-28-2023
Lynsey Harper, Plaintiff, v. Charleston County School District and Christopher Haynes, in his individual capacity, Defendants.
REPORT AND RECOMMENDATION
MARY GORDON BAKER, UNITED SWTES MAGISTRATE JUDGE
Plaintiff filed this action alleging race and sex discrimination and constructive discharge in violation of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (“Title VII”), 42 U.S.C. § 1981 (“Section 1981”), and 42 U.S.C. § 1983 (“Section 1983”). (Dkt. No. 1.) Plaintiff also sets forth a cause of action for violation of 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(e), an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (“EEOC”) regulation. (Id.) This matter is now before the Court upon Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment. (Dkt. No. 24.)
Pursuant to the provisions of Title 28, United States Code, Section 636(b)(1) and Local Rule 73.02(B)(2)(g), D.S.C., all pretrial matters in employment discrimination cases are referred to a United States Magistrate Judge for consideration. For the reasons set forth below, the undersigned RECOMMENDS that Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. No. 24) be GRANTED.
FACTUAL SUMMARY
Plaintiff, a Caucasian woman, began her employment with Defendant Charleston County School District (“the District”) in January 2016. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 3.)She began her employment with the District as a science teacher at Daniel Jenkins Academy, an alternative school for elementary and middle school students. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 3.) Plaintiff then worked at Liberty Hill Academy (“Liberty Hill”) for the 2016-2017 and 2017-2018 school years. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 3-4.) At Liberty Hill, she taught science to middle school students. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2.)
This Report and Recommendation reflects the pagination assigned by the Court's automated docketing system.
Before Plaintiff started teaching at Liberty Hill, the school was restructured to serve two different student populations. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 3-4.) Specifically, half of the school served day students with high special needs and half of the school served as an alternative school for elementary and middle school students who would otherwise have been expelled from their home schools. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 3-4.) The goal of the alternative school program was to help troubled students improve behavior and academic abilities. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2.) Students would attend Liberty Hill for a finite period of time and, assuming their behavior and academic abilities improved, they would then return to their home schools. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2.) Defendant Christopher Haynes served as the principal for Liberty Hill. (Dkt. No. 28 at 4.)
It is worth noting that Liberty Hill was also supposed to have two assistant principals; however, one of the assistant principal positions remained vacant for a period of time, leaving the school short-staffed. (Dkt. No. 25-6 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 5.)
At the beginning of the 2016-2017 school year, the District implemented a new disciplinary referral system through which teachers could submit student discipline referrals. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 5.) This system, called Review 360, allowed administrators to see the student discipline referrals and respond as necessary. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 5.) Using this system, discipline referrals were categorized by the level of the infraction and coded based upon the nature of the infraction. (Dkt. No. 25 at 2.) Jennifer Coker, the Director of Alternative Programs, was tasked with monitoring this new referral system. (Dkt. No. 28 at 4.) Plaintiff submitted many student discipline referrals throughout her time at Liberty Hill. (Dkt. No. 25-5; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 191-92.) Other teachers did, as well. (Dkt. No. 28 at 9-10.) In fact, Defendant Haynes sent an email to the teachers at Liberty Hill on November 8, 2017, explaining:
I just finished “closing without action” 159 discipline referrals. I am not sure if you get email notices for those. However, I feel that you deserve transparency and an explanation when I do that to the referrals that you write. First of all, you did nothing wrong. You are writing referrals as we have asked you to do. The issue is that we have had is that with being short staffed, it has been virtually impossible for [assistant principal] Ms. Wicker to handle all of the referrals that have come to her. She has also had little help with this. I also believe that after a certain time, referrals are not effective in changing behaviors. That is why I went and closed the referrals. I closed all referrals that had not been acted upon from the beginning of the year until October 13th. Any referrals written after that date are still active and will be handled immediately.(Dkt. No. 25 at 2; Dkt. No. 28 at 12.) At the end of the 2017-2018 school year, many other student discipline referrals were “closed without action. (Dkt. No. 28 at 13.)
Plaintiff claims that she was subjected to a hostile working environment at Liberty Hill beginning in 2017. (Dkt. No. 1; Dkt. No. 25 at 4; Dkt. No. 28 at 14.) Plaintiff asserts that her students harassed her on a regular basis by calling her a “white b****”, telling her “f*** you” and “f*** off”, swearing at her, making sexual comments in her presence, and, on at least one occasion, threatening violence. (Dkt. No. 25 at 4; Dkt. No. 28 at 8, 12-16.) Plaintiff does not allege that she was harassed by any District employees. (Dkt. No. 1; Dkt. No. 25 at 4.) Rather, Plaintiff claims that Defendants did not adequately respond to student discipline referrals she submitted after these instances of racial and sexual harassment. (Dkt. No. 1; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 8-9.)
According to Plaintiff, she began looking for a teaching position in a different district in February of 2018. (Dkt. No. 25 at 5; Dkt. No. 28 at 15-16.) Nonetheless, she signed a contract with Liberty Hill for the 2018-2019 school year. (Dkt. No. 25 at 5; Dkt. No. 28 at 15.) On June 13, 2018, she sent Defendant Haynes a resignation email which stated:
As you know, I was looking for a teaching position closer to home. I interviewed with the principal at College Park Middle School today and I was offered a position for the 2018-2019 school year contingent on being released from my contract with Charleston County. I have enjoyed the last two years and I have learned a lot from you.(Dkt. No. 25-3 at 12.) The District released Plaintiff from her contract. (Dkt. No. 25 at 5.)
A little over one week after resigning from Liberty Hill, Plaintiff testified at the termination hearing of another teacher employed by the District. (Id.) She testified that the working conditions at Liberty Hill were hard, that she felt intimidated once or twice, and that she felt unsafe at times. (Id.) She also testified that she had “a pretty thick skin and a good relationship with [her] students for the most part.” (Id.)
On November 6, 2018, Plaintiff filed a charge with the South Carolina Human Affairs Commission (“SCHAC”) claiming that she suffered harassment from August 15, 2017 through June 4, 2018. SCHAC issued a Notice of Right to Sue letter on May 15, 2019. (Dkt. No. 25 at 7.)
PROCEDURAL HISTORY
Plaintiff filed this civil action on May 18, 2021. (Dkt. No. 1.) In her Complaint, she brings causes of action for: (1) discrimination in violation of Title VII based on a racially and sexually hostile work environment; (2) discrimination in violation of Section 1981; (3) a custom, policy, or practice of racial and sexual discrimination in violation of Section 1983; and (4) violation of EEOC regulation 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(e). (Id.) Plaintiff seeks compensatory and punitive damages. (Id.) On February 21, 2023, Defendants filed a Motion for Summary Judgement. (Dkt. No. 24.) After requesting and receiving an extension of time to file, Plaintiff filed her Response. (Dkt. No. 28.) Defendants declined to reply by the April 3, 2023 deadline. (Id.) As such, the motion before the Court has been fully briefed and is ripe for disposition.
LEGAL STANDARD
Pursuant to Rule 56 of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, summary judgment “shall” be granted “if the movant shows that there is no genuine dispute as to any material fact and that the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed.R.Civ.P. 56(a). “Facts are ‘material' when they might affect the outcome of the case, and a ‘genuine issue' exists when the evidence would allow a reasonable jury to return a verdict for the nonmoving party.” The News & Observer Publ'g Co. v. Raleigh-Durham Airport Auth., 597 F.3d 570, 576 (4th Cir. 2010) (citing Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986)).
In ruling on a motion for summary judgment, “‘the nonmoving party's evidence is to be believed, and all justifiable inferences are to be drawn in that party's favor.'” Hunt v. Cromartie, 526 U.S. 541, 552 (1999) (quoting Anderson, 477 U.S. at 255); see also Perini Corp. v. Perini Constr., Inc., 915 F.2d 121, 123-24 (4th Cir. 1990). Although the Court must “draw all justifiable inferences in favor of the nonmoving party, the nonmoving party must rely on more than conclusory allegations, mere speculation, the building of one inference upon another, or the mere existence of a scintilla of evidence.” Sandlands C & D LLC v. Cty. of Horry, 737 F.3d 45, 54 (4th Cir. 2013) (citing Dash v. Mayweather, 731 F.3d 303, 311 (4th Cir. 2013)). “Only disputes over facts that might affect the outcome of the suit under the governing law will properly preclude the entry of summary judgment. Factual disputes that are irrelevant or unnecessary will not be counted.” Anderson, 477 U.S. at 248.
DISCUSSION
Defendants argue that Plaintiff's case should be dismissed in full. (See generally Dkt. No. 25.) According to Defendants, Plaintiff's claims fail because: (1) she cannot show that the harassment she experienced was based on her sex, was severe or pervasive, and was imputable to Defendants; (2) she cannot show that her working conditions were so intolerable as to compel a reasonable person to resign; (3) Section 1983 is the exclusive remedy for a violation of the rights guaranteed by Section 1981; (4) Plaintiff cannot show that her alleged injuries were the result of a policy or custom of harassment within the District; and (5) a violation of an EEOC regulation does not, in and of itself, create an independent cause of action in federal court. (See generally id.) In response, Plaintiff withdraws her Section 1981 claim, but argues that questions of material fact preclude summary judgment on her remaining claims. (See generally Dkt. No. 28.) For the reasons set forth below, the undersigned disagrees with Plaintiff and RECOMMENDS that the Court GRANT Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. No. 24).
I. Title VII Claims
A. Hostile Work Environment
As noted, Plaintiff brings race-based and sex-based hostile work environment claims under Title VII. (See generally Dkt. No. 1.) Because race-based and sex-based hostile work environment claims are anchored in the same statutory text, they are reviewed under the same standard. See National R.R. Passenger Corp. v. Morgan, 536 U.S. 101, 116 n.10 (2002) (citing Faragher v. Boca Raton, 524 U.S. 775, 786-77, 787 n.1 (1998)); see also Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 26 (1993) (Ginsburg, J., concurring) (“Title VII declares discriminatory practices based on race, gender, religion, or national origin equally unlawful.”).
Under this standard, “[a] hostile environment exists when the workplace is permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult that is sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim's employment and create an abusive working environment.” Boyer-Liberto v. Fontainebleau Corp., 786 F.3d 264, 277 (4th Cir. 2015) (en banc). Thus, to establish a prima facie hostile work environment claim, Plaintiff must show evidence of: (1) unwelcome conduct; (2) based on her race and/or sex; (3) which is sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of her employment and create an abusive working environment; and (4) which is imputable to Defendants. See id. It is undisputed that Plaintiff experienced unwelcome conduct. (See generally Dkt. Nos. 25, 28.) The undersigned considers the remaining three elements, below.
Defendants do not contest that Plaintiff experienced unwelcome conduct on account of her race. (See generally Dkt. No. 25.) The undersigned therefore assumes that Defendants concede this point. As such, Plaintiff satisfies the second prong of her race-based hostile work environment claim and the undersigned need only consider her sex-based hostile work environment claim in this section.
To establish the second prong of her sex-based hostile work environment claim, Plaintiff must show that she would not have been a victim of harassment but for her sex. See Gilliam v. S.C. Dep't of Juvenile Justice, 474 F.3d 134, 142 (4th Cir. 2007) (citing Causey v. Balog, 162 F.3d 795, 801 (4th Cir. 1998)). The Fourth Circuit has explained that the “critical issue” when analyzing this prong of a sex-based discrimination claim is “whether members of one sex are exposed to disadvantageous terms or conditions of employment to which members of the other sex are not exposed.'” Ocheltree v. Scollon Prods., Inc., 335 F.3d 325, 331-32 (4th Cir. 2003) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted). Further, “a trier of fact may reasonably find discrimination, for example, when a woman is the individual target of open hostility because of her sex, or when a female victim is harassed in such sex-specific and derogatory terms . . . as to make it clear that the harasser is motivated by general hostility to the presence of women in the workplace.” Id. (internal quotation marks and citations omitted).
Defendants claim that Plaintiff cannot show the unwelcome conduct she experienced “would not have occurred but for her sex.” (Dkt. No. 25 at 9.) In support of this contention, Defendants note that Plaintiff “conceded in her deposition that the students used offensive language, including the term ‘b[****],' indiscriminately and that such language was directed at both the male and female employees.” (Id. at 10.) Defendants further note that “students also used this term with each other regardless of the gender of person they were talking to,” and that “Mr. Haynes also testified that students had called him ‘b[****]' and [he] observed them us[ing] this term with other male employees . . . he understood the students to use this term more as an expression of anger or name calling and not in a sexually demeaning manner.” (Id.) As such, Defendants argue that Plaintiff “cannot show that the students were motivated by a general animosity towards women in the school or that she was exposed to disadvantageous terms or conditions of employment to which members of the other sex are not exposed.” (Id.)
In response, Plaintiff argues that “Defendants cite no specific examples of male teachers being called ‘b[****]'” and that “[t]he only ‘evidence' in this regard consists of Haynes's and Ms. Coker's offhand and unsupported allegations that the term was used ‘indiscriminately.'” (Dkt. No. 28 at 23.) Plaintiff further argues that she was subjected to other “agonizing and graphic epithets” that constituted sexually motivated discrimination, such as students telling her to “suck d***, you f***ing white b****.” (Id. at 24.) Plaintiff claims that these epithets and phrases are in and of themselves sexually offensive. (Id.)
As to Plaintiff's first argument, the undersigned finds it unconvincing. Indeed, Plaintiff completely ignores that she herself admitted students used the term “b[itch]” indiscriminately. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 12-13.) Other evidence in the record confirms that students used this term with faculty, and with each other, regardless of gender. (See id.; Dkt. No. 28-5 at 99; Dkt. No. 29 at 32.) Thus, the instances in which Plaintiff was called a “b****” cannot support her sex-based hostile work environment. However, the record does not conclusively demonstrate that other sexually explicit epithets and remarks directed towards Plaintiff were used indiscriminately or directed at both men and women. (See generally Dkt. Nos. 28-2, 28-3, 29, 29-1.) Although the record contains evidence that Liberty Hill students made sexually explicit remarks to each other and to male teachers and administrators, it does not show that the specific epithets and remarks directed at Plaintiff (other than “b****”) were also made to male students, teachers, or administrators. (Dkt. No. 28-2; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 74-79, 84, 93-96; Dkt. No. 25-5 at 4, 6, 19, 27, 30, 38.) A reasonable juror could therefore conclude that Plaintiff would not have experienced certain unwelcome conduct but for her sex. As such, Plaintiff can establish the second prong of her sex-based hostile work environment claim.
2. Sufficiently Severe or Pervasive
When considering the third element of a hostile work environment claim-the degree of hostility or abuse to which a plaintiff was exposed-the Court must “examin[e] the totality of the circumstances.” Spriggs v. Diamond Auto Glass, 242 F.3d 179, 184 (4th Cir. 2001). Relevant considerations “include the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee's work performance.” Id. Further, the “severe or pervasive” element of a hostile work environment claim includes both subjective and objective components; thus, Plaintiff must show that she subjectively perceived the environment to be abusive, and that the conduct was such that “a reasonable person in [Plaintiff's] position” would have found the environment objectively hostile or abusive. E.E.O.C. v. Sunbelt Rentals, Inc., 521 F.3d 306, 315 (4th Cir. 2008).
Defendants contend Plaintiff cannot establish that she experienced harassment so severe or pervasive as to alter the conditions of her employment and create an abusive working environment. (Dkt. No. 25 at 10.) With respect to the subjective component of this determination, Defendants assert that Plaintiff did not find Liberty Hill to be a hostile environment while she was employed there. (Id.) As support, Defendants point to the fact that Plaintiff never coded any student discipline referrals as “harassment,” nor otherwise complained to the administration about harassment. (Id. at 11.) Defendants also point out that Plaintiff never once complained about her job (including complaints about harassment or a hostile work environment) to the psychiatrist with whom she had regular appointments while she worked at Liberty Hill. (Id.) Further, Defendants note that the record is devoid of evidence that the alleged harassment seriously impacted Plaintiff's ability to do her job. (Id. at 12.) In fact, Plaintiff was considered a capable teacher and was offered a contract for the 2018-2019 school year. (Id.)
As for the objective component, Defendants assert Plaintiff cannot show that a reasonable person in her position would find the working environment at Liberty Hill objectively hostile or abusive. (Id. at 13.) Specifically, Defendants note that other Liberty Hill employees subjected to the same or similar treatment were not offended by it because, as teachers, they are trained to understand that the students' behavior stems from trauma they have experienced, not animosity towards their teachers. (Id.) In other words, they know not to take the students' comments personally. (Id.) Defendants explain that “[c]ourts have explicitly recognized, when analyzing hostile work environment claims arising in educational institutions, ‘that schools are unlike the adult workplace and that children may regularly interact in a manner that would be unacceptable among adults.'” (Id. at 12, citing Webster v. Chesterfield Cnty. Sch. Bd., 534 F.Supp.3d 537, 548 (E.D. Va. April 20, 2021)).
In response, Plaintiff contends that Defendants' arguments are not sustainable. (Dkt. No. 28 at 27-29.) Plaintiff claims that she did not file a grievance or make complaints to her psychiatrist because she did not want to risk losing her job. (Id.) She contends that the text of her student discipline referrals clearly delineate that she was being harassed, even if she did not code them as “harassment” referrals. (Id.) Plaintiff also claims that she experienced harassment of a severe, threatening, and humiliating nature, as evidenced by the student discipline referrals contained in the record. (Id.) For example, Plaintiff points to an incident where a student called Plaintiff a “white cracker b****” and asked the school's resource officer for his gun, implying that he (the student) planned to use it on Plaintiff. (Id.) Plaintiff further points to the “thousands” of student discipline referrals submitted by Plaintiff and her fellow teachers as evidence that harassment occurred frequently-“all day, every day,” according to Plaintiff. (Id.) Finally, Plaintiff contends that the alleged harassment “affected [her] work performance to the degree that she felt forced to resign for the sake of her mental health.” (Id. at 28.) Based on the foregoing, Plaintiff claims that there is at least a genuine issue of material fact as to whether the harassment Plaintiff suffered was sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of her employment and create an abusive environment. (Id. at 29.) The undersigned agrees.
Viewing the record as a whole and in the light most favorable to Plaintiff, a reasonable jury could conclude that Plaintiff experienced a hostile work environment while at Liberty Hill. Indeed, the student discipline referrals submitted by Plaintiff indicate that she was frequently subjected to humiliating, degrading, and physically threatening student behavior. (See generally Dkt. No. 25-5.) Deposition testimony throughout the record confirms that this behavior occurred daily. (See Dkt. Nos. 28-2, 283, 28-8, 28-10, 29, 29-1.) Even assuming that Liberty Hill teachers and administrators were taught to be especially understanding and to not take their students' conduct personally, a reasonable person in Plaintiff's position could find the working environment objectively hostile. In fact, the record reflects that, although certain Liberty Hill employees did not find the environment hostile, others did. (Dkt. No. 25-2 at 32; Dkt. No. 25-6 at 4; Dkt. No. 28-8; Dkt. No. 28-8 at 34-36; Dkt. No. 28-11 at 4.)
The evidence establishing Plaintiff's subjective belief that her work environment was sufficiently severe and pervasive is less concrete. As Defendants correctly note, Plaintiff's work performance did not noticeably suffer, she never complained of harassment or coded any student discipline referrals as “harassment” complaints, and she never mentioned a negative experience at Liberty Hill to her psychiatrist. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 7-9, 15-16, 22, 33-34; Dkt. No. 25-2 at 16-18; Dkt. No. 25-5; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 78-82, 130-34; Dkt. No. 29 at 235.) Further, the record does not reflect a noticeable decline in Plaintiff's mental health while working at Liberty Hill, and she explicitly stated on several occasions that she left Liberty Hill because she found a job closer to home, not because of the work environment. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 19-23; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 102-10, 113-18, 130-34.) Nonetheless, Plaintiff now contends that she found the work environment at Liberty Hill to be hostile and that she did not report it because she did not want to lose her job. (Dkt. No. 28 at 25-27.)
Ultimately, “whether [] harassment was sufficiently severe or pervasive to create a hostile work environment is quintessentially a question of fact for the jury.” See Conner v. Schrader-Bridgeport Int'l, Inc., 227 F.3d 179, 199-200 (4th Cir. 2000) (referencing Smith v. First Union Nat. Bank, 202 F.3d 234, 243 (4th Cir. 2000)). Because the record before the Court contains enough evidence to create a genuine issue of material fact on this point, the undersigned recommends that Plaintiff has satisfied the third prong of her hostile work environment claims.
3. Imputable to Defendants
Even so, Plaintiff's claims fail because there is no basis on which the impute liability to Defendants. Under Title VII, there are several circumstances in which liability may be imputed to an employer. Relevant here, an employer may be held liable for harassment of an employee by a non-employee third party when “the employer knew or should have known of the harassment and failed to take prompt remedial action reasonably calculated to end the harassment.” Freeman v. Dal-Tile Corp., 750 F.3d 413, 416, 422-23 (4th Cir. 2014). This “negligence standard” applies to third-party harassment because an employer may not avoid Title VII liability for such harassment by “adopting a ‘see no evil, hear no evil' strategy.” Id. (quoting Ocheltree, 335 F.3d at 334).
Defendants argue that Plaintiff fails to satisfy the fourth prong of her hostile work environment claims because the Liberty Hill students' actions cannot be imputed to Defendants under the aforementioned standard. (Dkt. No. 25 at 14.) Defendants explain that Plaintiff never informed any administrators that she found her students' conduct to be harassing or offensive. (Id. at 14-15.) Defendants note that “[t]hough she wrote up students using the referral forms, she did not ever code any conduct as sexual or racial discrimination or harassment. Without ever reporting that she felt harassed, it cannot be said that the District had actual knowledge of the harassment.” (Id. at 15.) Defendants further claim that they did not have constructive knowledge of Plaintiff's harassment because “reasonable employees in the District did not view the students' conduct as harassment,” and, as such, “the onus has to be on [Plaintiff] to report the subjectively offensive behavior.” (Id.) Defendants assert that liability cannot be imputed even if the Court were to find that the student discipline referrals submitted by Plaintiff put Defendants on notice of the alleged harassment because Liberty Hill administrators took steps reasonably calculated to stop the student behavior that Plaintiff reported. (Id.)
In response, Plaintiff claims that “[a]ny reasonable administrator who actually read [Plaintiff's student discipline referrals] would have all the information that she or he needed to fully understand that plaintiff was expressly relaying her justifiable feelings of being harassed.” (Dkt. No. 28 at 31.) Plaintiff further claims that the steps Defendants took in responding to her student discipline referrals were “nebulous responses with little to no actual consequence” that cannot be said to satisfy Defendants' duty to act, ” and that “at the end of the 2017-2018 academic year, there were a total of 1,721 discipline referrals in which no administrative actions was taken,” indicating that Defendants failed to adequately respond to teachers' complaints. (Id. at 32.)
Upon reviewing the parties' arguments and the evidence in the record, the undersigned agrees with Defendants that liability cannot be imputed in this case. As the Fourth Circuit has explained: “[A]n employer cannot be expected to correct harassment unless the employee makes a concerted effort to inform the employer that a problem exists under its reasonable procedures . . . employee[s] [ ] bear[ ] significant responsibility in notifying the employer.” E.E.O.C. v. Xerxes Corp., 639 F.3d 658, 674 (4th Cir. 2011) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted) (emphasis in original).
Here, the record irrefutably establishes that Plaintiff never filed a formal or informal harassment complaint and never told Defendant Haynes (or any other administrator) that she felt her students were harassing her because of her sex and race. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 7-9, 15-16, 34-35; Dkt. No. 25-2 at 16-18.) Instead, Plaintiff relies on her student discipline referrals, claiming that a reasonable administrator would have known Plaintiff was offended by her students' conduct and felt that she was being sexually and racially harassed. (Dkt. No. 28 at 31.) The undersigned finds this argument unconvincing. First, Plaintiff never coded a student discipline referral as “harassment.” (Dkt. No. 25-5; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 78-82; Dkt. No. 29 at 235.) She claims that she did not code her referrals in this way because she did not receive proper training and did not know how. (Dkt. No. 28 at 9.) However, Plaintiff never sought guidance on properly coding her referrals, nor did she attempt to file a harassment complaint in any other way. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 7-9, 15-16, 33-34; Dkt. No. 25-2 at 16-18; Dkt. No. 25-5; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 99-100, 144-45.) For example, the District had a specific reporting policy in place for filing harassment complaints that Plaintiff never utilized. (Dkt. No. 25-6 at 6-7, 9.) Plaintiff also never requested to transfer to another school, even though she knew Defendant Haynes had allowed other teachers to do so. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 4-5; Dkt. No. 25-6 at 11; Dkt. No. 28-2 at 42-43; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 46-47, 101.)
Further, the work environment at Liberty Hill was not that of a typical workplace in which the comments and behaviors Plaintiff reported were uncommon; rather, Liberty Hill students treated all teachers and administrators at the school with a similar level of disrespect and hostility. (See generally Dkt. Nos. 25-1, 25-2, 25-3, 25-5, 25-6, 28-2, 28-3, 28-4, 28-5, 28-8, 28-11, 29, 29-1.) Thus, it is reasonable that an administrator reading Plaintiff's student discipline referrals would not necessarily assume that Plaintiff was complaining of sexual and racial harassment. Indeed, the record shows that some Liberty Hill employees took offense to the students' conduct, and others did not. (Dkt. No. 25-2 at 32; Dkt. No. 25-6 at 4; Dkt. No. 28-8; Dkt. No. 28-8 at 34-36; Dkt. No. 28-11 at 4.) Ultimately, the record does not show that Plaintiff took steps to inform Defendants of the harassment she experienced. Instead, she waited until after she had left the District to file a complaint. Defendants therefore did not have an opportunity to address or correct Plaintiff's alleged harassment.
As the Supreme Court has noted, “[i]f Title VII's prohibitions against [] harassment are to be effective, employees must report improper behavior to company officials.” See Faragher, 524 U.S. at 806. The overwhelming evidence shows that Plaintiff did not do so here. Accordingly, Plaintiff has failed to establish a genuine issue of material fact as to the fourth prong of her hostile work environment claims. See Boyer-Liberto, 786 F.3d at 278 (noting that “a plaintiff seeking to impute liability to her employer for harassment [] may not be able to establish the employer's negligence if she did not report the harassment”). Because Plaintiff's hostile work environment claims fail as a matter of law, the undersigned recommends that Defendants are entitled to summary judgment on such claims.
Even if Plaintiff's student discipline referrals satisfied her reporting requirement, her hostile work environment claims would still fail because the record indicates that Defendants took action that was reasonably calculated to end the harassment. See Freeman, 750 F.3d at 423. Though Plaintiff emphasizes that many student discipline referrals were not addressed by the administration, she ignores the fact that referrals for the incidents on which she primarily bases her hostile work environment claims were addressed, just not to her liking. (See Dkt. No. 25-5.) Regardless, the record does not reflect a situation in which the District and its employees adopted a “see no evil, hear no evil” strategy to avoid liability. See Ocheltree, 335 F.3d at 334 (“[A]n employer cannot avoid Title VII liability for [third-party] harassment by adopting a ‘see no evil, hear no evil' strategy.”). Instead, the record shows that the District's administrators did their best to keep up with an overwhelming number of student discipline referrals, even though it was an impossible task. (See generally Dkt. Nos. 25-5, 28-12.)
B. Constructive Discharge
Plaintiff's constructive discharge claim fails as a matter of law for many of the same reasons as set forth above. To establish a prima facie case of constructive discharge, Plaintiff must show that: (1) her “working conditions became so intolerable that a reasonable person in the employee's position would have felt compelled to resign;” and (2) she “actually resign[ed] because of those conditions.” Perkins v. Int'l Paper Co., 936 F.3d 196, 206 (4th Cir. 2019).
The Fourth Circuit has made clear that “‘[i]ntolerability is not established by showing merely that a reasonable person, confronted with the same choices as the employee, would have viewed resignation as the wisest or best decision, or even that the employee subjectively felt compelled to resign.” Id. Rather, the Court must consider whether “a reasonable person in the employee's position would have felt compelled to resign, . . . that is, whether [s]he would have had no choice but to resign.” Id. Plaintiff cannot make this showing.
As noted above, Plaintiff never complained about the harassment she purportedly experienced at Liberty Hill. (See supra at 13-16.) However, this would have been the logical first step for an objectively reasonable person in Plaintiff's position. Further, as Defendant correctly notes, Plaintiff was employed by the District, not by Liberty Hill, and therefore could have requested a transfer or reassignment instead of resigning. (Dkt. No. 25 at 17.) Plaintiff never made such a request, even though she admitted that she knew of the District's transfer policy and knew that Defendant Haynes had allowed other teachers to transfer. (Dkt. No. 25-1 at 4-5; Dkt. No. 25-6 at 11; Dkt. No. 28-2 at 42-43; Dkt. No. 28-3 at 46-47, 101.) The undersigned simply cannot conclude that a reasonable person in Plaintiff's position would have resigned before taking these steps. See Perkins, 936 F.3d at 206. Plaintiff's constructive discharge claim therefore fails as a matter of law and should be dismissed.
What is more, Plaintiff testified-under oath-that she resigned to take a position closer to home and that she did not resign because of the stress of her job. (Dkt. No. 28-1 at 19.) This testimony is corroborated by the resignation email she sent to Defendant Haynes, which states: “[a]s you know, I was looking for a teaching position closer to home ....” (Dkt. No. 25-3 at 12.)
II. Section 1983 Claim
A. Legal Standard
Section 1983 provides a remedy against any person who, under color of state law, deprives another of rights protected by the United States Constitution. See City of Monterey v. del Monte Dunes, 526 U.S. 687, 707 (1999). Section 1983 is the procedural mechanism through which Congress provided a private civil cause of action based on allegations of federal constitutional violations by persons acting under color of state law. Jennings v. Davis, 476 F.2d 1271 (8th Cir. 1973). The purpose of Section 1983 is to deter state actors from using the badge of their authority to deprive individuals of their federally guaranteed rights and to provide relief to victims if such deterrence fails. McKnight v. Rees, 88 F.3d 417 (6th Cir. 1996). However, “[a] local government may not be sued under § 1983 for an injury inflicted solely by its employees or agents. Instead, it is when execution of a government's policy or custom, whether made by its lawmakers or by those whose edicts or acts may fairly be said to represent official policy, inflicts the injury that the government as an entity is responsible under § 1983.” Monell v. Dep't of Soc. Servs., 436 U.S. 658, 694 (1978).
There are three necessary elements for Monell liability. “‘First, the plaintiff must plausibly allege a constitutional harm that stems from the acts of a municipal employee taken in furtherance of some municipal ‘policy or custom.'” Washington v. Baltimore Police Dep't, 457 F.Supp.3d 520, 532 (D. Md. 2020) (quoting Milligan v. City of Newport News, 743 F.2d 227, 229 (4th Cir. 1984)) (internal citations omitted). A “policy or custom” can exist in four ways:
(1) through an express policy, such as a written ordinance or regulation; (2) through the decisions of a person with final policymaking authority; (3) through an omission, such as a failure to properly train officers, that “manifest[s] deliberate indifference to the rights of citizens”; or (4) through a practice that is so “persistent and widespread” as to constitute a “custom or usage with the force of law.”Id. (quoting Lytle v. Doyle, 326 F.3d 463, 471 (4th Cir. 2003)). Second, the plaintiff must allege facts “showing that the policy's creation is fairly attributable to the municipality.” Id. (citing cases.) Third, the plaintiff must allege an affirmative causal link between the “policy or custom,” and the particular injury suffered by the plaintiff. Id. (citing Spell v. McDaniel, 824 F.2d 1380, 1389 (4th Cir. 1987)).
B. Analysis
Plaintiff's Section 1983 claim alleges that Defendants:
[B]y and through [their] policy of not adequately staffing and funding Liberty Hill . . . and not promptly or adequately responding to the Plaintiff's referrals and complaints of student discipline . . . discriminated against [her] on the basis of her race and sex . . . and in violation of her right to equal protection as provided for in the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, by subjecting Plaintiff to a racially and sexually hostile work environment.(Dkt. No. 1.) However, as noted in Section I.A. above, Plaintiff has failed to sustain a hostile work environment claim. (See supra at 6-16.) As such, she cannot establish that Defendants violated her constitutional right to equal protection by subjecting her to a “racially and sexually hostile work environment.” See Riley v. Buckner, 1 Fed.Appx. 130, 133 (4th Cir. 2001) (noting that precedent applies the standard for Title VII hostile work environment claims to Section 1983 claims). In other words, Plaintiff cannot establish an injury on which to base her Section 1983 claim against Defendants. See Monell, 436 U.S. at 694 (explaining that the government as an entity is responsible under Section 1983 when the execution of a government's policy or custom inflicts a constitutional injury (emphasis added)); see also City of Monterey, 526 U.S. at 707 (“Section 1983 provides a remedy against any person who, under color of state law, deprives another of rights protected by the United States Constitution.” (emphasis added)). As such, Plaintiff's Section 1983 claim fails as a matter of law and the undersigned recommends that such claim be dismissed.
Even if Plaintiff could establish injury, her Section 1983 claim would still fail for the reasons set forth in Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment. (Dkt. No. 25 at 18-23.) Further, as noted above, the totality of the record does not show that the District and its employees consistently ignored racial and sexual harassment; rather the record shows that the District's administrators did their best to keep up with an overwhelming number of student discipline referrals and simply could not accomplish this impossible task. (See generally Dkt. Nos. 25-5, 28-12.)
As for Plaintiff's claim based on 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(e), such claim should also be dismissed. 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(e) is an EEOC regulation which states, in relevant part, that “[a]n employer may [ ] be responsible for the acts of non-employees, with respect to sexual harassment of employees in the workplace, where the employer (or its agents or supervisory employees) knows or should have known of the conduct and fails to take immediate and appropriate corrective action.”
Defendants argue that “[a] violation of [an] EEOC regulation does not-in and of itself-engender an independent cause of action because the regulations are not controlling upon the Court.” (Dkt. No. 25 at 23-24.) The undersigned agrees. Though Plaintiff claims that Defendants “fail to sustain their burden of establishing that this cause of action must be dismissed as a matter of law,” she cites to no case law in support of her position that an EEOC regulation creates an independent cause of action. (Dkt. No. 28 at 42.) The undersigned therefore recommends that this claim be dismissed.
Even assuming that Plaintiff could sustain an independent cause of action based upon 29 C.F.R. § 1604.11(e), Defendants would still be entitled to summary judgment on such claim for the reasons set forth in Section I.A.3 above.
CONCLUSION
Based on the foregoing, the undersigned RECOMMENDS that the Court GRANT Defendants' Motion for Summary Judgment (Dkt. No. 24) and dismiss Plaintiff's case in full.
Notice of Right to File Objections to Report and Recommendation
The parties are advised that they may file specific written objections to this Report and Recommendation with the District Judge. Objections must specifically identify the portions of the Report and Recommendation to which objections are made and the basis for such objections. “[I]n the absence of a timely filed objection, a district court need not conduct a de novo review, but instead must ‘only satisfy itself that there is no clear error on the face of the record in order to accept the recommendation.'” Diamond v. Colonial Life & Acc. Ins. Co., 416 F.3d 310 (4th Cir. 2005) (quoting Fed.R.Civ.P. 72 advisory committee's note).
Specific written objections must be filed within fourteen (14) days of the date of service of this Report and Recommendation. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Fed.R.Civ.P. 72(b); see Fed.R.Civ.P. 6(a), (d). Filing by mail pursuant to Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 5 may be accomplished by mailing objections to:
Robin L. Blume, Clerk
United States District Court
Post Office Box 835
Charleston, South Carolina 29402
Failure to timely file specific written objections to this Report and Recommendation will result in waiver of the right to appeal from a judgment of the District Court based upon such Recommendation. 28 U.S.C. § 636(b)(1); Thomas v. Arn, 474 U.S. 140 (1985); Wright v. Collins, 766 F.2d 841 (4th Cir. 1985); United States v. Schronce, 727 F.2d 91 (4th Cir. 1984).