Opinion ID: 164384
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: Graduate Faculty Status

Text: 27 Dr. Meiners claims that Dr. Keel's refusal to endorse her January, 2001 request for an extension of her graduate faculty status for the spring semester of 2001 was an act of retaliation for her filing of discrimination claims. The district court granted summary judgment on this claim on the ground that Dr. Meiners failed to establish that the denial of graduate faculty status was an adverse employment action. 28 To be an adverse action, the employer's conduct must be materially adverse to the employee's job status. Sanchez v. Denver Pub. Schs., 164 F.3d 527, 533 (10th Cir.1998). The adverse action must amount to a significant change in employment status, such as firing, failing to promote, reassignment with significantly different responsibilities, or a decision causing a significant change in benefits. Aquilino v. Univ. of Kansas, 268 F.3d 930, 934 (10th Cir.2001) (quoting Burlington Indus., Inc. v. Ellerth, 524 U.S. 742, 761, 118 S.Ct. 2257, 141 L.Ed.2d 633 (1998)). 29 In Aquilino, this Court held that a university's refusal to allow a faculty member who had been denied tenure to be on a graduate student's dissertation committee or to serve on the graduate faculty was not an adverse employment action. 268 F.3d at 934-35. The Court reasoned that removal of a faculty member's responsibilities with respect to graduate students was not an independently adverse action but rather a normal incident of the denial of tenure. Id. at 934. The plaintiff claimed that the university's action was adverse because it would injure her future employment prospects, but the Court determined that, [g]iven Dr. Aquilino's tenure situation, her removal from the committee had, at best, a de minimis effect on her future employment opportunities. Id. 30 Dr. Meiners claims that Aquilino is distinguishable because she has alleged a different harm, namely, the loss of eligibility for faculty travel grants. However, alleging a different sort of injury does not affect the applicability of Aquilino. The rule of Aquilino is that, where the employee does not challenge the underlying denial of tenure, the university's actions that are natural consequences of the denial of tenure do not constitute independent adverse actions, even if they might be harmful to the employee's interests. In such cases, the true cause of the harm to the employee, whether the harm is damage to future employment prospects or ineligibility for grants, is the denial of tenure and not the consequent removal from the graduate faculty. 1 Dr. Meiners does not dispute the district court's conclusion that, after the tenure denial, she was no longer eligible for membership on the graduate faculty. Meiners, 239 F.Supp.2d at 1184. Her loss of graduate faculty status was therefore a normal consequence of the denial of tenure, and under Aquilino, this does not amount to an adverse action.