An Administrator's Guide to California Private School Law

Chapter 7 - Recognizing And Preventing Harassment, Discrimination And Retaliation

Paris v. Faith Properties, Inc. 947 A teacher was subjected to sexual harassment by two high school students. The teacher complained to the School, who imposed discipline on the students. The teacher further complained she was not satisfied with the level of discipline imposed. A few months later, the School terminated the teacher’s employment and she sued the School, claiming retaliation under Title VII. The Court held the teacher could proceed with her retaliation claim, finding she engaged in protected activity by disagreeing with the level of discipline imposed.

To identify protected activity in the workplace effectively and accurately, schools should remember the following four points: 1. Protected activities are not limited to formal complaints and can take many forms. 2. A person can be retaliated against even if he or she is not the target of the complained-about conduct. Employees who complain about discriminatory conduct are protected, whether or not they have been subjected to that conduct. An employee who, for example, acts as a witness in another employee’s sexual harassment lawsuit is engaging in a protected activity. 3. An employee’s allegations of employer misconduct need not be ultimately correct for the employee’s actions to constitute a protected activity. So long as an employee has a reasonable, good faith belief that discrimination occurred, the employee’s attempts to expose or complain about that conduct will be protected. 948 4. An employee need not explicitly use the words “discrimination” or “harassment” to engage in protected activity. An employee engages in protected activity if he/she reasonably believes that his/her complaint concerns discrimination or harassment. But an employee may not simply make a vague complaint about personal grievances and expect that his or her employer will know that he/she is opposing discriminatory conduct. 949

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