Court Opinion

ID: 9903306
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-11-27 15:34:29.134533+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:11.748696
License: Public Domain

IN THE DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF FLORIDA
                     FIFTH DISTRICT

                                    NOT FINAL UNTIL TIME EXPIRES TO
                                    FILE MOTION FOR REHEARING AND
                                    DISPOSITION THEREOF IF FILED

DAVID WALTON,

            Appellant,

v.                                           Case No. 5D22-794
                                             LT Case No. 2021-01

LAKE-SUMTER STATE COLLEGE,

            Appellee.

________________________________/

Opinion filed April 14, 2023

Administrative Appeal from the
Lake-Sumter State College.

Tobe M. Lev, of Lev & Siwica, P.A.,
Orlando, for Appellant.

Brian Koji, of Allen, Norton & Blue, P.A.,
Tampa, for Appellee.

MAKAR, J.

      David Walton, Ph. D., was hired by Lake-Sumter State College as an

anthropology instructor in August 2015 and, after five years of service,

became eligible for, and was awarded, a continuing contract on July 31,

                                       1
2020. The continuing contract, which is a form of academic tenure, stated

that Dr. Walton’s employment would remain in force from year to year “unless

terminated by mutual consent in writing by the parties hereto or unless [Dr.

Walton] is suspended or removed for cause pursuant to law and rules of the

State Board of Education and the Board.” (Emphasis added). Less than a

year later, on June 3, 2021, Dr. Walton was informed via letter from the

College’s president that his continuing contract would terminate at month’s

end and not be renewed. Dr. Walton elected to contest his termination in an

administrative hearing, which resulted in a recommended order upholding

the College’s action that the College’s board affirmed. Dr. Walton now

appeals.

     Dr. Walton raises several issues on appeal, which we distill into two

distinct ones. The first is whether Dr. Walton’s termination was proper based

on the College’s determination that his workload, which included

anthropology courses and student success courses, was unsatisfactory and

thereby sufficient cause to end his contract. The second is whether the

College’s determination that demand for anthropology courses had declined

to the point that eliminating them entirely, and thereby also terminating Dr.

Walton’s employment, was sufficient cause under the continuing contract.

                                     2
      The applicable Florida administrative rule, entitled “Employment

Contracts for Full-Time Faculty,” states:

      Each district board of trustees may, upon recommendation of the
      president, terminate a full-time faculty employee under
      continuing contract, or return the employee to an annual contract,
      for failure to meet post-award performance criteria, or, for cause
      in accordance with college policies and procedures upon
      recommendation by the president and approval by the board.

Fla. Admin. Code R. 6A-14.0411(7)(a). The administrative rule specifies two

paths to employee termination: (1) a faculty member’s failure to meet post-

award performance criteria, or (2) for cause in accordance with college

policies and procedures. The College’s written policy is consistent with the

administrative rule; Dr. Walton’s continuing contract is likewise consistent,

and also includes resignation and “discontinuance” of Dr. Walton’s position

as grounds for termination.

      To begin, Dr. Walton argues, in part, that his dismissal was improper

because he did not fail to meet any post-award performance criteria by which

faculty are to be periodically reviewed. The purpose of the criteria is to

“contribute to the continual growth and development of faculty,” such that

each district board of trustees “shall adopt policy requiring periodic post-

award performance reviews for faculty under continuing contract” using the

same criteria for granting a continuing contract. Id. R. 6A-14.0411(6). A

poorly performing faculty member who falls short of meeting established

                                      3
post-award criteria can be let go without a finding that his termination was

“for cause.” It is an independent basis for terminating a faculty member under

a continuing contract.

      It is conceded that Dr. Walton performed commendably in his

academic life, including his teaching of the many courses that he was

assigned; his classroom performance and willingness to take on a heavy

workload were recognized as admirable. The College claims that Dr.

Walton’s termination is justified because he failed to teach enough

anthropology classes. Yet no post-award criteria had been established by

which the College could penalize Dr. Walton for teaching an insufficient

number of anthropology courses and too many student success courses, the

latter typically being relegated for economic reasons to adjunct or part-time

professors, rather than full-time professors. That the College had unilateral

but unadopted and undisclosed expectations that a full-time professor must

teach a certain percentage or number of courses within his discipline rather

than student success courses does not matter; those expectations must be

formally established as criteria pursuant to the administrative rule and the

College’s policy, and then made known to professors to be actionable, which

was not done as to Dr. Walton. As such, to the extent that Dr. Walton’s

termination was based on the College’s view that his anthropology workload

                                      4
did not meet its unilateral, unadopted, and unwritten expectations, that

conclusion was erroneous as a basis to terminate him, whether “for cause”

or otherwise. Indeed, Dr. Walton could not be terminated “for cause” due to

inadequate anthropology courses; doing so would make the “failure to meet

post-award performance criteria” portion of the administrative rule

superfluous. See Holmes v. Fla. A & M Univ. by & Through Bd. of Trs., 260

So. 3d 400, 406 (Fla. 1st DCA 2018).

      That said, a faculty member, even if stellar in his performance, can be

terminated under a continuing contract in Florida where a justifiable

determination is made that the adverse employment action is “for cause in

accordance with college policies and procedures.” The question presented

in this case is whether the evidentiary record supports the College’s

determination that discontinuing anthropology as an academic discipline

made available to its students was justified, thereby providing sufficient legal

cause for terminating its only anthropology professor, Dr. Walton.

      As an initial matter, the meaning of the phrase “for cause” in the

continuing contract is a subject of substantial debate, justifiably so. It is not

defined in the contract, nor is it defined in any applicable administrative rule,

statute, or policy. According to the foremost legal dictionary, “for cause” is

defined as “[f]or a legal reason or ground. The phrase expresses a common

                                       5
standard governing the removal of a civil servant or an employee under

contract.” For Cause, Black’s Law Dictionary 673 (8th ed. 2004); see, e.g.,

In re Piazza, 719 F.3d 1253, 1261 (11th Cir. 2013).1 Dictionary definitions

provide some guidance, but not much.

      Likewise, caselaw is sparse as to the definitional breadth of “for cause”

terminations in the education realm. In Florida, the general notion of “good

cause”—a close cousin of “cause”—is that its lack of a definition gives

educational institutions a degree of leeway to determine what is a sufficient

basis for termination. For example, in Spurlin v. School Board of Sarasota

County, 520 So. 2d 294, 296 (Fla. 2d DCA 1988), the deputy school

superintendent argued that “good cause” for termination was limited to the

“seven-deadly sins” set out in the statute then applicable to teachers (i.e.,

immorality, misconduct in office, incompetency, gross insubordination, willful

neglect of duty, drunkenness, and conviction of a crime involving moral

turpitude).

      1
        The Eleventh Circuit in Piazza quotes Black’s Law Dictionary but
adds that the understanding of “cause” “is not limited to legal dictionaries.
Non-legal sources from 1978 to the present have consistently defined
‘cause’ as ‘[g]ood or sufficient reason,’ as ‘[g]ood, proper, or adequate
ground of action,’ or as ‘reasonable grounds for doing . . . something.’” 719
F.3d at 1261 (dictionary citations omitted).

                                      6
      The Second District rejected this narrow view, concluding the “good

cause” standard that applied to the deputy school superintendent went

beyond the seven offenses because the phrase “good cause” was

undefined. The court stated that as “amorphous and unbounded as the

words ‘good cause’ may seem when not specifically elaborated upon by the

legislature, we are unwilling to ascribe to the expression a limitation which

forecloses a school board from exercising its ability to decline a

recommendation for a lawful, rational, non-arbitrary, non-statutory reason.”

Id. at 296 (emphasis added). It also noted the existence of “significant

considerations, both practical and literal, for not binding a school board to a

definition of ‘good cause’” in an overly cramped way. Id.; see also Dietz v.

Lee Cnty. Sch. Bd., 647 So. 2d 217, 218 (Fla. 2d DCA 1994) (Blue, J.,

specially concurring) (noting that “by failing to further define just cause, the

legislature gave school boards broad discretion to determine when a teacher

may be dismissed during the contract term”). A synthesis of the admittedly

limited caselaw supports the view that a termination “for cause” under a

continuing contract is permissible if an educational institution proves a lawful,

rational, non-arbitrary reason for doing so and no other impediment, such as

a lack of due process, stands in the way. See generally Gwen Seaquist &

Eileen Kelly, Faculty Dismissal Because of Enrollment Declines, 28 J.L. &

                                       7
Educ. 193, 207 (1999) (“For tenured, public faculty . . . the courts have

affirmed downsizing in those instances where the faculty received notice and

a hearing and the institution could demonstrate the need for the cuts. Only

in the cases of violations of an institution’s internal procedures have faculty

successfully challenged their dismissal.”).

      On this basis, we conclude that the College has the legal authority to

discontinue a discipline due to a documented lack of student interest and

enrollment. As a general matter, a college or university—like other

educational institutions serving their communities—has the discretion, within

legislative and institutional parameters, to define the scope of its course

offerings. The College, believing that anthropology would generate student

interest, hired Dr. Walton and marketed the discipline, hoping for sufficient

enrollment in the various courses he offered; it even awarded him a

continuing contract. When those efforts at establishing a beachhead for

anthropology courses were unsuccessful, nothing legally stood in the

College’s way from reassessing the ongoing viability of the discipline and

ultimately making the difficult decision to end the endeavor, particularly in the

face of declining overall enrollments. Discontinuation of anthropology was a

lawful and rational option.

                                       8
      We note that the administrative rule also allows for the termination of

a full-time faculty member under continuing contract upon “consolidation,

reduction, or elimination of an institution’s program.” Fla. Admin. Code R. 6A-

14.0411(7)(b). The parties agree, however, that anthropology is not a

program; instead, it is a “discipline” within the general education program. If

an institution can terminate a full-time faculty member under a continuing

contract for elimination of a program, it implicitly has the right to do so when

only a discipline is eliminated.

      Next, an inevitable result when a discipline is discontinued is that a

college or university must decide how it will handle the employment of

affected faculty and staff, perhaps by reassigning them to other disciplines,

if feasible, or by terminating them. The authority for doing the latter is

grounded in the principle that “for cause” terminations include those

necessarily resulting from the legally justified discontinuation of a discipline.

      Dr. Walton claims that his termination was improper because the

College president’s termination letter preceded the Board’s final action and

that the “discontinuance” of his professorship required more procedural

protections, but he failed to make these arguments prior to this appeal,

relying now on evidence not previously presented in the administrative

proceeding. To be consistent with the administrative rule, the College

                                       9
president should have recommended Dr. Walton’s dismissal, rather than

phrasing the letter as a termination, under the “for cause” standard. Fla.

Admin. Code R. 6A-14.0411(7)(a) (“Each district board of trustees may, upon

recommendation of the president, terminate a full-time faculty employee

under continuing contract . . . .”). Even so, the purported oversight is

harmless because Dr. Walton received an administrative hearing with full

due process that protected his vested contractual rights. Moreover, the

College sought to discontinue anthropology as a discipline; it did not seek to

discontinue Dr. Walton’s specific position while retaining anthropology. Had

it sought only the latter, the contractual provision upon which Dr. Walton

relies, but did not raise below, might have been implicated.

     The remaining factual question is whether the College adequately

documented its decision in the evidentiary proceedings in this case, such

that its determination to terminate Dr. Walton was based on sufficient cause

to discontinue anthropology as a discipline, which requires competent

substantial evidence.

     As background, the College, which has about 67-70 full-time faculty

members, provides educational services in Lake and Sumter Counties at

three campuses (Leesburg, Clermont, and Sumterville). Like many

educational institutions, the College had experienced significant declining

                                     10
enrollment since the peak in the 2019-2020 term. As for anthropology,

although efforts were made to increase student awareness of and enrollment

in various course offerings, the number of students enrolled was minimal.

For example, during the 2019 Fall Semester, when overall student

enrollment topped 5,000 college-wide, the number of students interested in

anthropology justified only two courses. Dr. Walton taught both courses as

well as student success courses to balance out his teaching load. His

workload, by itself, was not a basis for his termination because no post-

award criteria had been established; but it is a factor demonstrating that

student interest in anthropology was waning. Indeed, since before and after

Dr. Walton was awarded a continuing contract, the specter of low student

enrollment in anthropology courses in the Lake-Sumter State College system

hung over the curriculum. Ongoing low student enrollments in anthropology

courses continually required their cancellation, notwithstanding efforts by the

College and Dr. Walton to stave off what became inevitable: the

discontinuation of anthropology as a discipline for undergraduate

exploration.

      Both Dr. Walton and the College raise several other points and

counterpoints in their legal papers, but in the end the overarching legal

question is whether the College had the legal authority to discontinue a

                                      11
discipline, the study of anthropology, based on a lack of student interest and

enrollment and whether it adequately documented its decision in the

evidentiary proceedings in this case thereby justifying its decision to

terminate Dr. Walton, its only anthropology professor, notwithstanding his

unblemished performance. We conclude that it did.

     AFFIRMED.

LAMBERT, C.J., concurs.
HARRIS, J., concurs in part, and dissents in part, with opinion.

                                     12
                                                        5D22-794
                                                        LT Case No. 2021-01

HARRIS, J., concurring, in part, and dissenting, in part.

      I am in full agreement with the majority’s conclusion that it would have

been improper for Lake-Sumter State College to terminate the employment

of Dr. Walton based on a determination that his anthropology workload “did

not meet [the College’s] unilateral, unadopted, and unwritten expectations.”

However, I would further conclude that the College was not legally justified

in terminating Dr. Walton’s continuing contract for cause under the facts of

this case and would reverse the final order.

      Dr. Walton’s contract, drafted by and presented to him by the College,

sets forth four separate ways in which it could be terminated: by mutual

consent, suspension or removal for cause, by written resignation, or because

the position has been discontinued. The majority correctly notes that there is

no precise definition of “for cause” and then concludes that elimination of Dr.

Walton’s anthropology courses could constitute good cause sufficient to

terminate his contract.

      My reading of the contract leads me to the opposite conclusion. By

listing discontinuance of Dr. Walton’s position as a separate, distinct, and

alternative basis for termination, that ground is specifically excluded from

whatever “good cause” is ultimately determined to be.

                                      13
     While the College certainly has the ability to discontinue anthropology

as a discipline for undergraduate exploration, such a determination cannot,

under the terms of Dr. Walton’s contract, constitute good cause for his

termination. The reality is that Dr. Walton’s contract was unilaterally

terminated by the College’s president well before the Board made any

decision regarding program discontinuance. None of the contractual grounds

for termination existed at the time Dr. Walton was terminated. I would

therefore vacate the College’s final order and remand with instructions to

immediately reinstate Dr. Walton unless and until such time as the College

properly terminates his continuing contract of employment.

                                    14