Professor Sues Student (and university)

[clean]

Is this a "man bites dog" story?

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/professor-sues-student-who-complained-to-university-about-failing-grade/ar-AAMNxtL?li=BBnbfcL

The article is short on a lot of facts and Id be interested in hearing more facts.

Some of the problems I see right off the bat are that the professor has a policy where 100% of a class grade comes from the final? 
How copesetic is that?


As for faculty suing students, I dont know how this was resolved, but there was something that came before the faculty senate from the administration forbidding faculty from suing students! 


And why would faculty be prohibited from attending a grievance hearing ? 
"claiming that McEvoy failed to use all the options available to her to resolve the situation after she did not attend the grievance hearing. Kryzanski argued that his client had not been allowed to take part in the hearing process."  (Kryzanski is the professor's attorney).


Finally why would a faculty member object to a course grade of C- being changed to "pass"?


Anyone have any insights to share?

[Wahoo Redux]

"The student, Joseph Moran of New Jersey, was taking McEvoy's class in the legal environment of business"

Irony or extra credit?

Apparently she has sued the university before----age discrimination, I think.

And I know that we disdain RMP, but when you see a faculty getting nothing but defamatory reviews there is a problem.

She wanted the test mailed to her.  They don't have Blackboard or D2L at this place?

She sounds a little cray-cray to me.

[clean]

She wanted the test mailed to her.  They don't have Blackboard or D2L at this place?

I remember a discussion about that on here in the last few months.  The consensus of opinion, as I recall, was that it was nuts to ask the students to go to the post office!  IF the faculty member needs to grade a printed document, the buy a damn Printer and deal with the exams on your own time and dime!  It is YOUR problem, not theirs! 

[ergative]

Clean, I was just thinking of that discussion. The worst part of this case is that the exam was supposed to be mailed with tracking, and since the student neglected to include tracking, the exam, when it arrived safely received a failing grade.

And then we have this as the basis for the defamation claim: "Defendant Moran's statement that he 'did not feel comfortable with [McEvoy's] re-grading his paper from a non-bias way' was defamatory in that he was representing that he felt she would be biased in grading his paper just because he filed a complaint with the Fairfield administration," the professor's lawsuit alleges"

Buddy, you did the equivalent of failing an in-person exam for using the wrong color ink, and when the student complained you were overruled. I'm 100% with the student here.

When I was a TA I once had a student pull a fast one about submission deadlines and get away with it. Something like not turning in the assignment an then emailing me later to ask if I'd gotten it, accusing me of losing it, and then 'resubmitting' a digital document with a creation timestamp dated from after we'd discussed the solutions in class. (The professor knew all the details but wanted to give them the benefit of the doubt so I was overruled.) I was so mad that for the rest of the semester I would swap grading with a fellow TA: they got five of my students' assignments, including the cheater's submission, and I took five of their students' assignments. We swapped five-and-five rather than just the one assignment, because I didn't want the other TA to know which of my students I couldn't be objective about. I did this because I knew I couldn't be objective about it.

[RatGuy]

Clean, I was just thinking of that discussion. The worst part of this case is that the exam was supposed to be mailed with tracking, and since the student neglected to include tracking, the exam, when it arrived safely received a failing grade.

...

Buddy, you did the equivalent of failing an in-person exam for using the wrong color ink, and when the student complained you were overruled. I'm 100% with the student here.

I was under the impression that the exam was late. Yes, the student didn't include tracking (per the instructions) and that's why the student didn't realize it was two days late. I'm not suggesting that McEvoy has set an unreasonable policy -- I think she has -- but she's also following her stated policies regarding the exam.

I don't understand the basis for the lawsuit.

[Caracal]

Not a lawyer, so I might be wrong, but it seems like this is one of those cases where a lawsuit is going to just get tossed.

Does a professor actually have standing to sue in court about changes to a student's grade? You aren't allowed to sue just because you don't like something. You have to show it causes you actual tangible harm, which is going to be hard to do.

Defamation seems even weaker. Certain kinds of speech enjoy immunity from defamation charges. For example, you can't be sued for defamation for something you argue in a court. There are also protections given to things like government meetings. I would think that a grade appeal would fall in a similar category. You'd probably have to show that a student was making a malicious claim they knew to be false in that setting. Since the claim is just that the professor graded the paper unfairly, that would be pretty difficult.

Of course, beyond all that, this person is clearly off their rocker. In some circumstances, I could see fighting something like this, or bringing it to the attention of accreditors or professional bodies. Suing a student because they won a grade appeal is obviously not an appropriate step to take.

[nebo113]

Some of the problems I see right off the bat are that the professor has a policy where 100% of a class grade comes from the final?
How copesetic is that?

Unrelated to the legal issues:  I once was enrolled in a graduate course where the prof was basing the entire grade on a 50 question final exam.  I dropped the course.

[ergative]

Clean, I was just thinking of that discussion. The worst part of this case is that the exam was supposed to be mailed with tracking, and since the student neglected to include tracking, the exam, when it arrived safely received a failing grade.

...

Buddy, you did the equivalent of failing an in-person exam for using the wrong color ink, and when the student complained you were overruled. I'm 100% with the student here.

I was under the impression that the exam was late. Yes, the student didn't include tracking (per the instructions) and that's why the student didn't realize it was two days late. I'm not suggesting that McEvoy has set an unreasonable policy -- I think she has -- but she's also following her stated policies regarding the exam.

I don't understand the basis for the lawsuit.

Here's the relevant passage: Exams were to be mailed to the professor's home no later than June 12, 2020. Moran mailed his exam on June 8, but failed to have it tracked, according to the suit. Therefore, when it arrived at McEvoy's home on June 16, it received a failing grade.

This may have been stated more clearly in the original instructions than in the article, but 'Mail your exam by June 12' is fully ambiguous between 'Your exam must be postmarked by June 12' and 'I must receive your exam by June 12', and since 'mailing' something refers to the action on the part of the sender, the interpretation on my end favors 'postmarked' rather than 'received by'.

Taxes need to be postmarked by April 15. Christmas presents need to be received by December 25th. For absentee ballots, whether it's postmark or receipt that matters depends on the state and sometimes on the outcome of the state's lawsuit when they change their mind and want to change the date after the election and so sue.

I wonder what the assignment instructions actually said.

[clean]

Another article shedding a sliver of light...

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/08/02/professor-sues-university-over-its-response-student%E2%80%99s-grade


This short note includes that the instructions noted that the assignment was made in May and that the instructions indicated that the professor must receive the assignment by a certain date or an F would be awarded.  The student did not track the letter, though the professor had paid for that option. 

The exam was sent to students at the end of May. Students were told that McEvoy had to receive responses by June 12. The instruction said anyone who did not turn in the exam on time would receive a failing grade."

[marshwiggle]

Another article shedding a sliver of light...

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/08/02/professor-sues-university-over-its-response-student%E2%80%99s-grade


This short note includes that the instructions noted that the assignment was made in May and that the instructions indicated that the professor must receive the assignment by a certain date or an F would be awarded.  The student did not track the letter, though the professor had paid for that option. 

The exam was sent to students at the end of May. Students were told that McEvoy had to receive responses by June 12. The instruction said anyone who did not turn in the exam on time would receive a failing grade."

And presumably the tracking would allow her to check if any had been mailed on time but were delayed in delivery.

[clean]

Of course, submitting through Blackboard (or Canvas) would have:
a. Cost less,
b. allowed for instant tracking
c. could have checked for plagiarism
d. not required students to go to the post office in the Days of COVID to handle setting up tracking on a package
e. But would have required the professor to print (though a printer would likely be cheaper than paying for postage!!)

In my collegiate experience I have even TAKEN a class such as this one.  It would be a class to junior level college students, not law students. These are not future lawyers and the exams (note multiple) could easily have been multiple choice!  Adding a proctoring service like Examity would even monitor the students to keep the most blatant forms of cheating down!**(see below).

So WHY THIS design for exams, for this level of course?


** Note that I used Examity for a junior level class in Real Estate Principles. They monitored the exam and then ended up catching a student that had placed a cell phone on the computer so that it was in the right corner of the computer screen. They had some suspicions related to her eye movement and there was some other noises and they asked her to pan the room, and the computer's reflection was seen in the TV screen showing the lights from the cellphone and the  blocking of the computer screen.  I took her to Student Court and the video led to her conviction and an F in the course.  No way I would have caught it without live proctoring!!

Anyway, lots of questions, few answers about what seems to be a convergence of mismanagement of the processes all around!



ONE Last thing.... As a full professor, I have had the 'privilege' to serve on grievance committees. (The "benefit of being a Full Professor is that you can serve on nastier committees)! I dont remember, exactly,  but I think that the rules prohibit allowing an attorney.  You can HAVE one, they just can not interrupt the proceedings.  They can pass you notes, but not speak on your behalf before the committee.  So the later article noted that THE ATTORNEY was not allowed to participate in the proceeding, not that the faculty member was not allowed to participate.  IF she CHOSE not to attend, then her ability to sue may become in question. 


What about YOUR places? AS far as you recall, does YOUR grievance policy allow attorneys to participate actively?

[Wahoo Redux]

Actually, I did see challenge to non-renewal which gave the "plaintiff's" lawyer room for a five minute statement, and then the lawyer commenced to talk for 40 minutes.

[Vkw10]

Some of the problems I see right off the bat are that the professor has a policy where 100% of a class grade comes from the final?
How copesetic is that?

Unrelated to the legal issues:  I once was enrolled in a graduate course where the prof was basing the entire grade on a 50 question final exam.  I dropped the course.

When my brother attended law school in the 1980s, standard practice was to have the entire grade based on a 3-hour, 3-question final exam. Disturbing him during exam week was not wise.

[clean]

When my brother attended law school in the 1980s, standard practice was to have the entire grade based on a 3-hour, 3-question final exam. Disturbing him during exam week was not wise.

That is probably still standard in Law School, but Legal Environments of Business is usually a junior level business class (otherwise called "business law" and it mostly covers the Uniform Commercial Code.

[ergative]

Another article shedding a sliver of light...

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2021/08/02/professor-sues-university-over-its-response-student%E2%80%99s-grade


This short note includes that the instructions noted that the assignment was made in May and that the instructions indicated that the professor must receive the assignment by a certain date or an F would be awarded.  The student did not track the letter, though the professor had paid for that option. 

The exam was sent to students at the end of May. Students were told that McEvoy had to receive responses by June 12. The instruction said anyone who did not turn in the exam on time would receive a failing grade."

And presumably the tracking would allow her to check if any had been mailed on time but were delayed in delivery.

Right, so that clears up the postmark/received by confusion. But I still don't see the point of tracking. Tracking is important if the exam never arrives and the student needs to prove they sent it (or, rather, sent something). But if the exam does arrive, and has a postmark from before June 12th, then why would tracking matter? It was sent on time. It arrived late. If late arrival means an automatic fail, then tracking wouldn't change that; and if the important thing is an on-time dispatch, then a postmark should serve the purpose just as well as tracking. How does seeing what happened during the time in was in the USPS system change anything, once the exam arrives?