McAvoy v. Dickinson Coll., 2024 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 20732 (U.S. Ct. of Appeals, 3d Cir., August 16, 2024) (Chagares, J.)
Claim of violation of Title IX, as a result of college failing to respond appropriately to investigate sexual assault in a timely and adequate manner. Summary judgement granted District Court and upheld by Third Circuit.
CHAGARES, Chief Judge.
Rose McAvoy claims that Dickinson College (“Dickinson”) violated Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, 20 U.S.C. § 1681(a) (“Title IX”), and breached its contract with her by failing to respond to and investigate her sexual assault claim in a timely and adequate manner. The District Court granted Dickinson’s motion for summary judgment, holding that McAvoy failed to produce sufficient evidence that Dickinson acted with deliberate indifference to her assault under Title IX and did not produce sufficient evidence of breach of contract damages. For the reasons that follow, we will affirm.
Title IX provides, inter alia, that no person “shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.” 20 U.S.C. § 1681(a). Title IX primarily was designed to prevent schools from using federal funds in a sexually discriminatory manner. Gebser v. Lago Vista Indep. Sch. Dist., 524 U.S. 274, 292, 118 S. Ct. 1989, 141 L. Ed. 2d 277 (1998). To that end, its nondiscrimination mandate is chiefly enforced by agencies through means authorized by the statute, including the termination of federal funding. Id. at 280-81.
We reiterate, in conclusion, that our role in this case is limited. While we sympathize with the fact that McAvoy underwent a traumatic and upsetting experience, we are not tasked with considering TS’s actions or with substituting our own judgment for Dickinson’s manner of sanctioning him. We consider only whether Dickinson acted with deliberate indifference to McAvoy’s assault. Applying Davis, we conclude that, even if Dickinson could have done more, communicated more frequently, and acted more quickly, the evidence shows that its response was not clearly unreasonable under the known circumstances, so Dickinson was not deliberately indifferent. See Davis, 526 U.S. at 648 (holding that Title IX recipients are deliberately indifferent only where the response (or lack of response) to student-on-student harassment “is clearly unreasonable in light of the known circumstances”). Summary judgment therefore was appropriate. See, e.g., Johnson, 972 F.3d at 915 (concluding that summary judgment for school on deliberate indifference claims was appropriate where the school tried to conduct an investigation and it put a no-contact order into place); Karasek, 956 F.3d at 1108 (concluding that the university was not deliberately indifferent where it investigated the complaint, interviewed the assailant, and imposed sanctions).
In addition to her Title IX claim, McAvoy contends that Dickinson breached its contract with her by failing to abide by the terms of its Policy, specifically the sixty-day timeline and written notice provisions. Pennsylvania law recognizes that the relationship between a student and a private educational institution is contractual in nature, so a student may bring a breach of contract action if the institution is claimed to have violated that contract. Swartley v. Hoffner, 1999 PA Super 168, 734 A.2d 915, 919 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1999). To prevail on her breach of contract claim against Dickinson, McAvoy was required to establish the existence of a contract, its breach, and resulting damages. See McShea v. City of Phila., 606 Pa. 88, 995 A.2d 334, 340 (Pa. 2010). Assuming without deciding that McAvoy satisfied the other elements for a breach of contract claim, summary judgment was appropriate because she did not produce evidence that she suffered damages caused by the claimed breach. See Logan v. Mirror Printing Co. of Altoona, 410 Pa. Super. 446, 600 A.2d 225, 226 (Pa. Super. Ct. 1991) (requiring a causal connection between the breach and the loss).
Even accepting that Dickinson’s failure to notify McAvoy in writing constituted a breach, 17 McAvoy failed to establish that the lack of notice caused her claimed injuries (that is, continuing to encounter TS during spring 2018 while the investigation was ongoing and delaying her graduation). There is ample evidence that McAvoy was made aware of the investigation’s progress during its pendency, while there is no evidence that the asserted injuries were caused by a lack of written notice. We therefore agree with the District Court that summary judgment was appropriate.
For all of the foregoing reasons, we conclude that the District Court properly granted summary judgment to Dickinson on McAvoy’s Title IX and breach of contract claims. We therefore will affirm the judgment of the District Court.
