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UCLA Cases
$2.95 Million Award
Janet Conney, former assistant clinical professor at the UCLA Neuropsychiatric Institute and Hospital, sued the Regents of the University of California and UCLA for gender discrimination, sexual harassment, and retaliation. The court awarded Conney $2.95 million. Her case is the twelfth against UC supported by the American Association of University Women Legal Advocacy Fund. She also sued three former male colleagues individually for other claims. She filed her complaint in June 2003.
In July 1998 Conney received a geriatric psychiatry fellowship position. In May 1999, she was offered a position as assistant clinical professor. Soon after she accepted this position, she was demoted to clinical instructor for reasons unknown to her. Her department's director offered her a promotion to assistant clinical professor within the department in February 2001. She accepted and signed a contract for this promotion, which was supposed to go into effect in July 2001 at the start of the new fiscal year. However, this promotion did not occur. Moreover, male colleagues accused her of malpractice. She learned that similarly situated males were paid 50 to 100 percent more than she and of other inequitable practices.
She lodged complaints with the human resources department in April and June 2002. UCLA had declined to renew her contract in June 2002.
Sources: AAUW press release and Outlook, vol. 98, no. 1
$1.3 Million Settlement
In 1994, David Dixon was dropped from UCLA's residency program in family medicine, two months before he would have completed it. Like Angela Spell and others at the UCD Medical School who were dismissed from their program (see Fall 2001 Newsletter), Dixon is African American and was dropped for-allegedly-poor performance. He sued the university, claiming that he had been affected by "a pattern of racial discrimination against African-American interns." Ten years later, in July 2004, the Regents reached a $1.3 million settlement. Typically, UC denies any liability, but "we recognized the uncertainties of a trial and the possibility of a large judgment in the event of an adverse verdict," said UC lawyer Christopher Patti.
Source: Chronicle of Higher Education 6/20/04
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