United States Court of Appeals

for the Fifth Circuit

No. 21-30451

Ocheowelle Okeke, Doctor, 

Plaintiff—Appellant,

versus

Administrators of Tulane Educational Fund, 

Defendant—Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court

for the Eastern District of Louisiana

No. 2:20-CV-450

Before Stewart, Clement, and Elrod, Circuit Judges.

Per Curiam:*

The plaintiff in this case brought three types of Title VII claims against 

the Administrators of the Tulane Educational Fund (Tulane), alleging that 

she was discriminated against because of her race and sex while a resident at 

the medical school. Because she has failed to satisfy at least one necessary 

* Pursuant to 5th Circuit Rule 47.5, the court has determined that this 

opinion should not be published and is not precedent except under the limited 

circumstances set forth in 5th Circuit Rule 47.5.4.

United States Court of Appeals

Fifth Circuit

FILED

April 6, 2022

Lyle W. Cayce

Clerk

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element for each of her claims, we AFFIRM the district court’s grant of 

summary judgment to Tulane on all of the claims.

I.

Plaintiff Dr. Ocheowelle Okeke is licensed to practice medicine in the 

State of Missouri. She attended Tulane’s Combined Residency Program in 

Internal Medicine and Pediatrics (Med-Peds) from 2014 to 2018. After 

completing the program, Dr. Okeke became a board-certified specialist in 

both internal medicine and pediatrics, and she obtained her top-choice 

fellowship in rheumatology at the University of St. Louis School of Medicine. 

She brought this Title VII lawsuit alleging that she, a Black physician, 

suffered race and gender discrimination and a hostile work environment 

during her time at Tulane. 

A.

The facts that Dr. Okeke alleges to support her claims generally can 

be sorted into two categories: (1) those suggesting that she was treated poorly 

regarding scheduling; and (2) those suggesting racial prejudice on a more 

personal or social level. 

First, the scheduling facts: As background, when Dr. Okeke rotated 

through the Internal Medicine program during her Med-Peds residency, 

most of the Internal Medicine residents—and the program director—were 

White. However, the Med-Peds program director, Dr. Princess Dennar, was 

the first Black-woman program director and brought in an entirely minorityfemale resident class for the Med-Peds program, of which Dr. Okeke was a 

member. Dr. Okeke asserts that she and other minority-female residents 

were given harder rotations and poorer educational and employment 

experiences by the Internal Medicine program director compared to Whitemale Internal Medicine residents. Specifically, she claims that Dr. Jeffrey 

Wiese, a White-male director of the Internal Medicine program, seized

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authority over Med-Peds residents’ schedules (an authority which, she says, 

belonged to Dr. Dennar) and: (1) prevented Dr. Okeke from completing four 

weeks of rotation in the Emergency Department; and (2) in general assigned 

the minority-female residents of the Med-Peds program to harder rotations 

and less training. She claims that she spent considerably more time working 

in inpatient wards and on harder rotation teams compared to White-male 

residents in Internal Medicine. Dr. Okeke contends that these actions 

prevented the Med-Peds residents from meeting graduation requirements set 

by their program director1(however, Dr. Okeke was certified for graduation

and she graduated on time).

Next, the other facts which Dr. Okeke claims demonstrate racial 

prejudice at a personal level by other doctors associated with the Internal 

Medicine program: She presented testimony from Dr. Dennar that a Whitemale faculty member assumed that Dr. Okeke failed her STEPS,2 and that 

during applicant review he often would make that assumption when he would 

see the picture of a Black person’s face. Dr. Dennar also testified that 

although Dr. Wiese and the residency programs chairman would typically 

send congratulations to Dr. Dennar whenever a new class of residents was 

“match[ed],” she received no such congratulations upon the matching of 

Dr. Okeke’s all-minority-female class. The chairman instead expressed that 

in the future they needed to review the metric used to rank applicants. 

1 Similarly, she asserts that the scheduling actions prevented her from 

“moonlighting”—a privilege which residents can sometimes take advantage of and which 

allows them to earn some extra money by working additional time. 

2 “STEPS” are criteria from the United States Medical Licensing Examination 

used for residency ranking.

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Dr. Wiese stated in an e-mail to the chair of Internal Medicine that he 

was considering reducing the number of Med-Peds residents from six to four 

in the upcoming year. He explained his reasoning in the e-mail: 

There are also some cultural issues that are arising out of the 

med-peds program because of, I believe, some excessively 

elevated expectations (and when those excessively elevated 

expectations are not met, people are unhappy). Having a more 

manageable number might allow addressing those 

expectations.

Dr. Okeke asserts that this statement about “cultural issues” actually reflects 

a displeasure from Dr. Wiese with the all-minority-female nature of the MedPeds resident class. 

She also points to some occasions in which she believes Dr. Wiese 

failed to give her proper recognition. She claims that Dr. Wiese did not know 

her name on one occasion and at another point initially left her out of an 

e-mail congratulating all residents who obtained a fellowship. And she points 

to an incident in which, after Dr. Okeke and some co-residents complained 

about harder rotations, Dr. Wiese told them, “I control the schedule, and you 

need to be team players.” On a similar note, Dr. Dennar reports an occasion 

in which an assistant program director contacted Dr. Dennar and described 

Dr. Okeke as angry and difficult to deal with. Ultimately, though, no one 

reported such a thing about Dr. Okeke in any written evaluation. 

In response to Dr. Okeke’s claims, Tulane presents these facts:

First, Tulane claims that Dr. Okeke is simply wrong that she was 

treated poorly as to scheduling compared to similarly situated parties. The 

residency program, Tulane explains, is intense, condensing six years’ worth 

of specialty training into four. Tulane contends that Dr. Okeke is mistaken

that the amount of emergency training she received was deficient. Although 

the Accreditation Council on Graduate Medical Education (ACGME) 

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provides accreditation standards for residency programs to satisfy, much of 

the scheduling is driven institutionally by Tulane and the needs of its partner 

hospitals. 

To that end, for the Internal Medicine rotation, residents are assigned 

to a “firm” or “learning community” made up of Internal Medicine 

residents or residents and interns who, like Dr. Okeke, are part of a combined 

program like Med-Peds. At any given time, four out of the five “firms” work 

in hospitals and one works in the clinics. The harder and easier rotations are 

divided among the firms in a generally equal manner, and within Dr. Okeke’s 

firm (Red Firm), the more difficult rotations generally were spread evenly. 

At a more detailed level, residents had some degree of agency over their 

schedules—after the first year, there was a process for residents to seek their 

preferred weeks for the various rotations and for time off. 

Tulane asserts that Dr. Okeke participated in this scheduling process 

and was able to select and complete every rotation she asked for. It also 

presented testimonial evidence that her time in the more difficult rotations 

was consistent with that of the Internal Medicine residents in her same firm. 

As for the issue of whether Dr. Okeke was deprived of adequate 

emergency room training, Tulane posits that her training satisfied ACGME 

standards. It notes that although it is a “core requirement” that Med-Peds 

residents get exposure to emergency medicine, it is merely a “detail 

requirement” that they complete at least four weeks of such training. In 

other words, while all residents receive at least two weeks in the emergency 

room, Tulane may fill the additional two weeks with rotations which involve 

emergency exposure through other means. Indeed, it is the norm for Tulane 

residents to receive only two weeks of specific emergency department 

rotation. Thus, Dr. Okeke did receive four weeks’ worth of emergency 

training and satisfied all ACGME requirements. 

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Perhaps most significantly, Tulane notes that Dr. Okeke completed 

her residency program on time, received all her stipends, graduated, became 

certified in both internal medicine and pediatrics, and obtained her firstchoice fellowship. 

B.

In April 2018, Dr. Okeke and some of her co-residents complained of 

discrimination to the ACGME and asked it to intervene. The ACGME 

conducted an investigation and found no evidence of any discrimination or 

Title VII violations. Dr. Okeke also made a complaint to Tulane’s Office of 

Institutional Equity, which likewise conducted an investigation and found no 

evidence of any discrimination in violation of Tulane’s policies. She also filed 

a charge with the EEOC, which did not take up her case. 

Dr. Okeke received her right-to-sue letter from the EEOC and then

sued Tulane, claiming race and gender discrimination under disparatetreatment and disparate-impact theories, and a hostile work environment, in 

violation of Title VII. After discovery, Tulane moved for summary judgment 

on Dr. Okeke’s claims of disparate treatment and hostile work environment. 

It moved separately for summary judgment on Dr. Okeke’s disparate-impact 

claim. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of Tulane on 

all the claims. 

II.

Dr. Okeke has not presented evidence sufficient to survive summary 

judgment for any of her three Title VII claims. We therefore affirm the 

district court’s grant of summary judgment to Tulane on all the claims.

A.

We review a district court grant of summary judgment de novo. 

Martinez v. Tex. Workforce Comm’n, C.R. Div., 775 F.3d 685, 687 (5th Cir. 

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2014). Summary judgment is appropriate when “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). Relatedly, summary judgment is appropriate 

when the nonmoving party fails to establish an essential element of that 

party’s case. Celotex Corp. v. Catrett, 477 U.S. 317, 322 (1986). In such 

circumstances, “there can be no genuine issue as to any material fact, since a 

complete failure of proof concerning an essential element of the nonmoving 

party’s case necessarily renders all other facts immaterial.” Id. at 323

(internal quotations omitted).

B.

Dr. Okeke appeals the district court’s grant of summary judgment to 

Tulane on her claim of disparate-treatment race discrimination under Title 

VII. The district court granted summary judgment to Tulane on this claim 

because it concluded that Dr. Okeke failed to present direct evidence of 

discriminatory motive, failed to show that she suffered an adverse 

employment action, and failed to show that she was treated less favorably 

than her counterparts who are not part of her protected group. Because we 

agree that Dr. Okeke failed to demonstrate that she suffered an adverse 

employment action, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary 

judgment on her disparate-treatment claim.

Title VII prohibits an employer from discriminating against an 

employee regarding conditions or privileges of employment because of the 

employee’s race, color, religion, sex, or national origin. 42 U.S.C. 

§ 2000e-2(a). Under the disparate-treatment theory of employment 

discrimination, a plaintiff “must show disparate treatment and 

discriminatory motive.” Johnson v. Chapel Hill Indep. Sch. Dist., 853 F.2d 

375, 381 (5th Cir. 1988). A plaintiff may support her claim by presenting 

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either direct or circumstantial3 evidence of discriminatory motive. Cicalese v. 

Univ. of Tex. Med. Branch, 924 F.3d 762, 766 (5th Cir. 2019). But either way,

the plaintiff must ultimately demonstrate that she was subjected to an 

adverse employment action because of the discriminatory motive. 42 U.S.C. 

§ 2000e-2(a)(1) (identifying as an unlawful employment practice an 

employer’s discrimination “against any individual with respect to his 

compensation, terms, conditions, or privileges of employment” (emphasis 

added)); St. Mary’s Honor Ctr. v. Hicks, 509 U.S. 502, 523–24 (1993) 

(explaining that Title VII awards damages “only against employers who are 

proven to have taken adverse employment action by reason of [the protected 

characteristic]”).

4

3

If the plaintiff provides only circumstantial evidence of discrimination, she can 

shift the burden of production to the defendant to show a nondiscriminatory reason for the 

employment action if she can otherwise satisfy all the elements of a prima facie case. 

McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 802 (1973). Those elements are that the 

plaintiff:

(1) is a member of a protected group; (2) was qualified for the position at 

issue; (3) was discharged or suffered some adverse employment action by 

the employer; and (4) was replaced by someone outside [her] protected 

group or was treated less favorably than other similarly situated employees 

outside the protected group. 

McCoy v. City of Shreveport, 492 F.3d 551, 556 (5th Cir. 2007). If the defendant meets its 

subsequent burden to show a legitimate nondiscriminatory reason for the adverse 

employment action, then the burden of production shifts back to the plaintiff again to prove 

that the reason proffered by the employer was pretextual. McDonnell Douglas, 411 U.S. at 

802, 804–05.

4 See also Zamora v. City of Houston, 798 F.3d 326, 331 (5th Cir. 2015) (explaining 

that a plaintiff bringing a Title VII discrimination claim must show that the employer’s 

discriminatory motive was a motivating factor “for an adverse employment action”); 

Peterson v. Linear Controls, Inc., 757 F. App’x 370, 374 (5th Cir. 2019) (holding that even 

though the plaintiff may have presented direct evidence of racial animus, the plaintiff’s 

Title VII discrimination claim was properly dismissed because he “was not subjected to an 

adverse employment action”); Brown v. Liberty Mut. Gr., Inc., 616 F. App’x 654, 658 (5th 

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Dr. Okeke argues that she has offered both direct and circumstantial 

evidence of discriminatory motive. But even if she has offered direct 

evidence, she has failed to demonstrate that she suffered an adverse 

employment action.

Dr. Okeke points to the e-mail sent by Dr. Wiese discussing “cultural 

issues arising out of the med-peds program” as direct evidence of 

discriminatory motive. The e-mail includes the following:

I do think that our long-term goal for next year is to reduce 

Med-Peds to 4 positions a year. It is hard to have a combined 

program (med-peds) that is larger than the primary program 

(peds). . . . I cannot functionally use the med-peds residents at 

the VA (i.e. Continuity clinics), and that leaves us with a GME 

deficit on the medicine half of their time, as the medicine 

program is more and more dependent upon the VA.

There are also some cultural issues that are arising out of the 

med-peds program because of, I believe, some excessively 

elevated expectations (and when those excessively elevated 

expectations are not met, people are unhappy). Having a more 

manageable number might allow addressing those 

expectations.

Even assuming arguendo that the reference to cultural issues could be 

interpreted as racial, that would not create an issue of material fact, as 

Dr. Okeke has not suffered an adverse employment action as required to 

succeed on a disparate-treatment claim. Dr. Okeke alleges that she suffered 

an adverse employment action because she had a “harder workload resulting 

in lack of material training, lack of moonlighting compensation opportunity, 

and loss of vacation time benefit . . .” and because she “was unable to 

Cir. 2015) (“As with a discrimination claim, a Title VII retaliation claim requires an adverse 

employment decision.”).

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complete the Med[]-Peds program requirements.” Tulane responds that 

each of these alleged facts is either simply incorrect or does not qualify as an 

adverse employment action under Title VII. We agree with Tulane.

We first set aside Dr. Okeke’s contention that she was unable to 

complete the program requirements. She was. She was certified for 

graduation and graduated on time, and she had no issue obtaining 

certification to practice in both internal medicine and pediatrics. 

As for the other contentions, we agree with Tulane that they do not 

qualify as adverse employment actions under Title VII. Such actions 

traditionally “include[d] only ultimate employment decisions such as hiring, 

granting leave, discharging, promoting, or compensating.” McCoy v. City of 

Shreveport, 492 F.3d 551, 559 (5th Cir. 2007) (quoting Green v. Adm’rs of 

Tulane Educ. Fund, 284 F.3d 642, 657 (5th Cir. 2002)). But the Supreme 

Court has held that in the context of Title VII retaliation claims, a “materially 

adverse” action like being reassigned to an unquestionably worse job may be 

actionable even if not an ultimate employment decision. Burlington N. & 

Santa Fe Ry. Co. v. White, 548 U.S. 53, 61, 68, 70–71 (2006). Similarly, in the 

context of substantive claims of discrimination under Title VII, we have 

explained that changes in job responsibilities may qualify if they amount to 

“the equivalent of a demotion” to an objectively worse role. Thompson v. 

City of Waco, 764 F.3d 500, 503–05 (5th Cir. 2014). But we have specifically 

held that “[m]erely changing working hours or imposing a higher workload 

does not qualify” as an adverse employment action under Title VII. Outley 

v. Luke & Assocs., Inc., 840 F.3d 212, 217 (5th Cir. 2016). 

Thus, Dr. Okeke’s assertions regarding her schedule or working 

conditions, lack of moonlighting opportunities (as a result of the alleged 

harder schedule), and loss of some vacation time do not amount to adverse 

employment actions. She was not moved into a less prestigious role or a role 

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with fewer or less-significant responsibilities; her pay was not decreased and 

her total hours were not changed. Although she asserts that she spent more 

time in harder rotations and had to use some vacation time when she did not 

want to, she has presented no evidence that such treatment was in any way 

inconsistent with the job description and responsibilities assigned from the 

beginning to her and other residents. That being so, Dr. Okeke has failed to 

demonstrate that she has suffered an adverse employment action,5 and so she 

cannot make a claim for disparate treatment under Title VII. We affirm the 

district court’s grant of summary judgment in Tulane’s favor on that claim.

C.

Dr. Okeke also appeals the district court’s grant of summary judgment 

to Tulane on her claim of a hostile work environment under Title VII. The 

district court granted summary judgment to Tulane because it concluded that 

the actions which Dr. Okeke alleges supported her claim were not sufficiently 

severe or pervasive to sustain the claim. We agree with the district court and 

affirm its grant of summary judgment to Tulane on Dr. Okeke’s hostile work 

environment claim.

To support her hostile work environment claim, Dr. Okeke alleges 

that Dr. Wiese “yelled” at her and others for raising scheduling issues; that 

she was subjected to a harder work schedule; that Dr. Wiese forgot her name 

once and omitted her from a congratulatory e-mail; and that some other 

faculty members made negative assumptions or remarks about her. Tulane 

responds that the district court was correct that none of these acts, separately 

or combined, are sufficiently severe or pervasive for her claim to succeed, and 

5 Because we conclude that Dr. Okeke has not shown an adverse employment 

action—the third element of a prima facie case of disparate treatment under Title VII—we 

need not address whether the fourth element is satisfied: whether she was treated less 

favorably than a similarly situated person.

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asserts that none of the perceived slights against her were linked to her status 

as a member of a protected class. 

A plaintiff employee bringing a hostile work environment claim under 

Title VII based on a supervisor’s conduct must show 

(1) that the employee belongs to a protected class; (2) that the 

employee was subject to unwelcome . . . harassment; (3) that 

the harassment was based on [a protected characteristic]; and 

(4) that the harassment affected a “term, condition, or 

privilege” of employment.

E.E.O.C. v. Boh Bros. Constr. Co., L.L.C., 731 F.3d 444, 453 (5th Cir. 2013) 

(en banc) (quoting Lauderdale v. Tex. Dep’t of Crim. Just., Institutional 

Div., 512 F.3d 157, 162–63 (5th Cir. 2007)). “For harassment . . . to affect a 

term, condition, or privilege of employment, as required to support a hostile 

work environment claim under Title VII, it must be ‘sufficiently severe or 

pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim’s employment and create an 

abusive working environment.’” Ramsey v. Henderson, 286 F.3d 264, 268 

(5th Cir. 2002) (quoting Harris v. Forklift Sys., Inc., 510 U.S. 17, 21 (1993)). 

Thus, we consider the frequency and severity of the alleged conduct, as well 

as whether “it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive 

utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work 

performance.” Walker v. Thompson, 214 F.3d 615, 625 (5th Cir. 2000)

(quoting Harris, 510 U.S. at 23).

The conduct to which Dr. Okeke points was not sufficiently severe or 

pervasive to sustain a hostile work environment claim. Even if all her 

allegations are true, working a hard schedule, being scolded as part of a group

for not being a team player regarding scheduling, and having someone forget 

to include her or say her name on a couple occasions are neither severe nor 

pervasive conduct in the context of a rigorous four-year combined residency 

program. And even if some other faculty had inappropriately made 

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assumptions about her qualifications, it was a supervisor and not Dr. Okeke 

who knew about it at the time. 

From the record, then, it is clear that at the most Dr. Okeke was 

subjected to the occasional “mere offensive utterance” and not to pervasive 

or severe conduct that would unreasonably interfere with job performance. 

See id. As we have said before, it is not enough to simply show that 

“colleagues were sometimes offensive and boorish. . . . Title VII does not 

impose a ‘general civility code’ on employers.” West v. City of Houston, 960 

F.3d 736, 743 (5th Cir. 2020) (quoting Faragher v. City of Boca Raton, 524 

U.S. 775, 788 (1998)). And as for the alleged harsher scheduling, being 

“directed to perform tasks that fell within [the] job description” generally is

insufficient to sustain a hostile work environment claim. Peterson v. Linear 

Controls, Inc., 757 F. App’x 370, 375 (5th Cir. 2019); see also Hobbs v. City of 

Chicago, 573 F.3d 454, 464 (7th Cir. 2009) (“No reasonable jury could 

conclude that being assigned duties that were part of one’s job description 

. . . amount[s] to a hostile work environment.”).

Because Dr. Okeke cannot satisfy the requirement that “the 

harassment affected a ‘term, condition, or privilege’ of employment,” see 

Boh Bros., 731 F.3d at 453, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary 

judgment to Tulane on the hostile work environment claim.

6

D.

Finally, Dr. Okeke appeals the district court’s grant of summary 

judgment to Tulane on her disparate-impact claim. In support of her claim,

she points to the same evidence which allegedly shows that she and other 

6 Because we hold that Dr. Okeke has not shown that she suffered harassment that 

affected a term, condition, or privilege of employment, we need not address whether any 

alleged harassment was based on a protected characteristic.

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minority women from the Med-Peds program were treated less favorably 

regarding scheduling when rotating through Internal Medicine. The district 

court granted summary judgment to Tulane on this claim because it 

concluded that Dr. Okeke did not specifically identify a “particular, facially 

neutral policy or practice” of Tulane, and because she failed to show 

“disparate effects and causation” from any such practice. We agree with the 

district court that Dr. Okeke has failed to identify a particular, facially neutral 

policy of Tulane that brought about a disparate impact. We thus affirm the 

grant of summary judgment to Tulane on Dr. Okeke’s disparate-impact 

claim.

A disparate-impact claim differs from a disparate-treatment claim. 

While, as discussed above, a disparate-treatment claim must include an 

allegation of intentional discrimination, a disparate-impact claim targets

employer practices that “are not intended to discriminate but in fact have a 

disproportionately adverse effect on minorities.” Ricci v. DeStefano, 557 U.S. 

557, 577 (2009). To sustain a disparate-impact claim under Title VII, a 

plaintiff must (1) identify a specific, facially neutral policy or practice of the 

employer, and (2) show that the policy or practice has caused a 

disproportionately adverse effect on a protected class. Pacheco v. Mineta, 448 

F.3d 783, 791 (5th Cir. 2006); Pouncy v. Prudential Ins. Co. of Am., 668 F.2d 

795, 799–802 (5th Cir. 1982).

It is critical that the plaintiff identify “the specific employment 

practice that is challenged.” Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. v. Dukes, 564 U.S. 338, 

357 (2011) (quoting Watson v. Fort Worth Bank & Tr., 487 U.S. 977, 994 

(1988)). “Thus, ‘[t]he disparate impact model applies only when an 

employer has instituted a specific procedure, usually a selection criterion[,]

. . . that can be shown to have a causal connection to a class based imbalance 

. . . .” Anderson v. Douglas & Lomason Co., Inc., 26 F.3d 1277, 1284 (5th Cir. 

1994) (quoting Pouncy, 668 F.2d at 800). 

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Dr. Okeke has failed to identify a specific employment practice that 

purportedly caused her to work a harder schedule. She has alleged that 

Dr. Wiese took over the scheduling authority for Med-Peds residents that 

belonged to Dr. Dennar. But she has not pointed to any such policy or 

practice that has brought about a disparate impact based on race. If, for 

instance, she had presented evidence that in finalizing schedules Dr. Wiese 

applied some sort of criteria that resulted in less favorable schedules for the 

minority-female Med-Peds residents, this might be a different case. As it is, 

Dr. Okeke has only presented evidence that Dr. Wiese’s involvement in 

scheduling arguably led to an undesirable result for her.7

Because Dr. Okeke has not satisfied the requirement for disparateimpact claims that she identify a specific, facially neutral policy used by

Tulane, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment to Tulane 

on this claim.

7 Dr. Okeke asserts that she need not point the blame on one specific policy. For 

that position, she cites Title VII’s directive that “if the complaining party can demonstrate 

to the court that the elements of a respondent’s decisionmaking process are not capable of 

separation for analysis, the decisionmaking process may be analyzed as one employment 

practice.” 42 U.S.C. § 2000e-2(k)(1)(B)(i). In her view, then, she need only assert that 

the scheduling process overall has had a disparate impact. We disagree. Dr. Okeke has not 

demonstrated that elements of Tulane’s scheduling process “are not capable of separation 

for analysis.” In fact, she has separated them: She has explained that the first stage of 

scheduling involves an objective “snake draft” in which more senior residents gets 

preference; and then, she asserts, Dr. Wiese changed the schedules before final publication. 

It is Dr. Wiese’s involvement which she alleges caused a disparate impact. And even if 

Dr. Okeke had alleged a specific policy of Tulane, she has not shown that any disparate 

impact she has experienced regarding scheduling reflects a racial disparity.

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* * *

We AFFIRM the judgment of the district court granting summary 

judgment to Tulane on Dr. Okeke’s Title VII claims of disparate treatment, 

hostile work environment, and disparate impact.

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