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Texas Thirteenth Court of Appeals (Corpus Christi-Edinburg)
ISD Fails to Get All of Ex-Principal’s Suit Dismissed
Ruling: One part of a principal’s employment discrimination suit against her former district is dismissed while the other part can continue to be litigated. Pharr-San Juan-Alamo ISD v. Melba Lozano, No. 13-16-00408-CV. Issued Jan. 31, 2018.
Lozano claimed she was demoted from high school principal to assistant middle school principal from one school year to the next due to her having cancer, which records said caused her to miss a number of days of work to undergo cancer treatments. The ISD contended that the demotion stemmed from a high schooler’s senior prank that went awry (that text messages between Lozano and the prankster reflected that Lozano knew about beforehand) and for poor work performance.
Lozano also said that she resigned from the district as of the end of her first school year as assistant middle school principal because the district’s offer of employment for the next school year was not for a principalship. Lozano characterized her resignation as a “constructive discharge” [termination] due to discrimination.
The ISD appealed after the trial judge refused to dismiss the suit. A three-member Thirteenth Court panel: 1) upheld dismissal on the demotion part of Lozano’s suit and 2) reinstated — and sent back to the trial court judge for further proceedings — the part of Lozano’s suit claiming she had been constructively discharged.
The justices said that Lozano had filed a Texas Workforce Commission (TWC) complaint over the demotion issue 10 days after a six-month deadline to do so had expired and had filed her TWC “constructive discharge” complaint before the six-month deadline had expired.