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An Award Without an Attorney:
an anonymous but true case history
Instinctively you knew when your job was the one chosen for sacrifice
to the budget cuts that it had nothing to do with your performance. Moves
and children had cost you some publications, so you were happy to get a
lectureship at UCX, but you'd been a tenured faculty member in other states
for more than twenty years and were devoted to teaching. But you were the
one woman lecturer in this science department, and middle aged.
When you ask for reasons you get no answers, or contradictory ones;
you get stonewalled. You manage to file a grievance before the statute of
limitations runs out only to find that the University ignores the procedure's
stipulated response deadlines. There are no watchdogs, no penalties; the
dean backs up the chairman with no investigation. You feel your case is
strong, but you have a personal bias against litigation. What can you do?
You decide to try the California Department of Fair Employment and
Housing (DFEH) where you also file a Federal complaint. You learn that the
DFEH is a neutral agency with a year long backlog. They warn you to get an
attorney if you want someone on your side and then reluctantly take your
case. You will have to wait a year, but at least the statute of limitations
clock stops ticking.
The DFEH works by persuading both parties to settle and your
caseworker repeatedly urges you to take what you can get. Your confidence
is so undermined you consult an attorney but find that your law library
knowledge is sound and less expensive. However, a specialist does provide
tax-saving language. Meanwhile you continue to let the UCX counsel know
that you are not going away without a fight, copying every letter to an
attorney friend. Does that makes them worry about lawsuits? The University
makes an initial settlement offer that forbids future work at UCX. When you
object, they reduce the ban to five years.
At last DFEH announces that they will come to UCX to investigate, but
urges you to settle first. The five year ban on UC employment doesn't seem
unfair to them. You telephone UCX's legal counsel and joke that you can't
sell your principles so cheaply. When they offer $100,000 you're so worn
down you accept. You've won, haven't you?
When the University agrees to settle, you soon realize that you didn't
really win. You waged a war of principles for so
long and in the end gave up the principle. You have money but no job, and life
goes on as usual at UCX. But perhaps in the future someone at UCX will think
twice about disposing of loyal academicians, they may not be too old to
fight.
-wage@wage.org-