Janelle Quinn v. Columbia County School District

2 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 Jannelle Quinn, on behalf of herself and her minor child, D.J.Q., appeals an order of the district court granting summary judgment to Columbia County School District ("the District") in her suit alleging discrimination and retaliation under Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. After careful review, we affirm.

I. FACTUAL BACKGROUND & PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Quinn filed this suit in April 2022. In her complaint, she set out two claims: racial discrimination under Title VI ("Count One"), and retaliation under Title VI ("Count Two"). Importantly, Count One was brought on behalf of D.J.Q. and Count Two was brought on behalf of both Quinn and D.J.Q. After discovery, the District moved for summary judgment. Quinn opposed the District's mo- tion, and the parties submitted various evidence in support of their positions. The evidence the parties submitted, construed in the light most favorable to Quinn, see Guevara v. Lafise Corp., 127 F.4th 824, 828 (11th Cir. 2025), showed the following. Quinn's child, D.J.Q., was enrolled at Parkway Elementary School ("Parkway") for the 2020-21 school year. Columbia County manages and controls Parkway. Quinn was a Military and Family Life Counselor whom Magellan Federal ("Magellan"), a third party, assigned to work at two schools within Columbia County during the 2020-21 school year: Parkway and Greenbrier Elemen- tary School. Quinn and D.J.Q. are both Black. In January 2021, during lunch, D.J.Q. sought the attention of Julie Owens, a White counselor who worked at Parkway, to request a different eating utensil. Instead of providing D.J.Q with a new utensil, Owens took

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 3 the eating utensil D.J.Q. was holding, placed it in D.J.Q.'s mouth, removed it, and placed it back in D.J.Q.'s hand, telling him to

"clean" the utensil he had. Owens then went back to her lunch duties and D.J.Q. continued to eat his lunch with the utensil he al- ready had. Later that day, D.J.Q. told his mother that he had "the worst day ever" and described the incident. He also reported being uncomfortable and anxious to be around Owens going forward. The next day, Quinn and her husband met with the principal of Parkway, Dr. Michael Doolittle, about the incident. During the meeting, neither Quinn nor her husband expressed any concern that Owens's behavior was discriminatory or racially motivated. Owens, however, apologized to D.J.Q. and Quinn and, in Dr. Doo- little's view, D.J.Q. accepted her apology. Still, Dr. Doolittle re- ported the incident to his supervisor, Dr. Deborah Williams. Dr. Doolittle, Dr. Williams, and the Superintendent of Columbia County Schools, Sandra Carraway, also reviewed video footage of the incident, and the District instituted efforts to prevent contact between Owens and D.J.Q.¹

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4 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 Quinn sent a letter to the Board of Education on January 24, 2021, in which she explained that the incident "was humiliating"

and put D.J.Q. at risk due to the pandemic. She also stated that

"[a]n apology" was "a far cry from enough." She "call[ed] on the Columbia County Board of Education to . . . stand up for our chil- dren and strongly condemn this sort of behavior," but she did not specify what action she wanted the Board to take. Quinn, Dr. Doolittle, and Dr. Williams had another meeting in late February. At this meeting, Quinn reported, for the first time, that she believed that the incident was a racist act. Quinn had no knowledge of Owens ever taking action toward another person based on race or skin color and had heard no complaints from D.J.Q. about Owens before the January 2021 incident. However, Quinn alleged that Owens had made comments in the past suggest- ing racial animus, such as stating that there were "too many Mexi- cans in Walmart." Dr. Doolittle reported that he had never before received a complaint of discrimination against Owens, and Quinn admitted that she had not witnessed any behavior between Owens and other students of any race.

Unsatisfied with the District's response, Quinn made several additional reports about the incident, including to the Professional Standards Commission and the U.S. Department of Justice. In April 2021, Quinn filed a police report with the Columbia County Sheriff's Office because she believed that Owens should be charged a letter in February 2021 noting that, consistent with Quinn's request, Owens had been instructed not to meet with D.J.Q. one-on-one.

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 5 with either assault or battery. The report to the Sheriff's Office made Owens "distraught" and she was sent home from the school. In April, Dr. Doolittle reported the ongoing situation to Dr. Wil- liams's replacement, Associate Superintendent Michele Sherman. Quinn did not, however, report the incident to her employer, Ma- gellan.

The parties dispute the degree of disruption caused by these reports and Quinn's other actions. Quinn admitted that she was angry and believed that the District should have fired Owens, but denied causing any disruption. Dr. Doolittle explained that he be- lieved Quinn was "causing a disruption because she was every- where that [D.J.Q.] would go." He believed that Quinn had stopped performing her job responsibilities, which were "to be with students and doing counseling sessions." Dr. Doolittle did not discuss these concerns with Quinn because "she was not [his] em- ployee." However, Dr. Doolittle told Sherman that Quinn was

"following her child's class around and observing things in the school outside of her duties as a counselor." Sherman also recalled that, in Dr. Doolittle's view, Quinn had expressed "that the only resolution that would work for [her] was for Ms. Owens to be fired."

The record suggests the District's decision to separate Ow- ens and D.J.Q. was largely successful in that the two only interacted one other time during the rest of the school year. That one subse- quent interaction is barely described in the record. In fact, Quinn expressly stated that she did not know "what the scenario was,"

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6 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 and "all [she] kn[e]w" was that Owens "spoke" to D.J.Q. Dr. Doo- little explained that Owens's schedule was changed to avoid inter- actions between her and D.J.Q. and that he instructed her to "have no contact" with D.J.Q. From his perspective, there was no need to discipline Owens because the District had been "making the [re- quested] changes and doing the things that were done" regarding Owens's schedule. Williams also did not believe discipline was necessary and did not think that the incident was racially moti- vated. Quinn, on the other hand, wanted the District to terminate Owens or issue some other form of appropriate discipline. Near the end of the 2020-21 school year, the District granted Quinn's re- quest for D.J.Q. to change schools before the start of the 2021-22 school year.

As noted above, during this time Quinn had been splitting duties between the Greenbrier and Parkway elementary schools. Prompted by the ongoing situation, Sherman spoke with Beth Welch, another Magellan employee. The District had "no com- plaints regarding" the quality of Quinn's work, but contacted Welch to help "calm the situation at the school" and to "have a conversation about what ha[d] transpired." Magellan, apparently, did not know that Quinn worked at the same school as her son, until the District—through Sherman—contacted the company. Whereas the District had no prohibition on staff working where their children attend school, Magellan had such a policy and its pol- icy was strict—Welch knew of no instance of a Magellan employee working at the same school as their child. Quinn argued that she was unaware of Magellan's policy and that, in any event, there was

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 7 no conflict of interest because her objectivity was not compro- mised by working in the same school that D.J.Q. attended. Welch testified during her deposition that Magellan would have never assigned Quinn to Parkway if it knew her son attended the school. Quinn disagreed with that contention, based on the fact that she was not asked where her son attended school when she started working for Magellan and that Magellan's conflict-of- interest policy does not explicitly address this situation. Yet, she conceded that she did not bring the fact that D.J.Q. attended Park- way to the attention of Magellan at the time she began working there. The record does not show any other incident where a coun- selor with Magellan worked in the same school as their child, and Welch testified that this was because of Magellan's existing poli- cies. Quinn also explained that Magellan had told her that the Dis- trict asked that she not return to Parkway.

The Department of Defense, a program covered under Ti- tle VI, directs the overall management of the Military and Family Life Counselor program. After speaking with Sherman, Magellan reported the situation to the manager of the Military and Family Life Counseling program, pursuant to Magellan's contract with the federal government. Welch recommended that Quinn complete the remainder of the school year at Greenbrier. The federal gov- ernment investigated the matter and agreed with Welch's recom- mendation, and Quinn returned to work only at Greenbrier for the remainder of the year. During the course of the federal govern- ment's investigation—April 29, 2021, through May 3, 2021—

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8 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 Magellan instructed Quinn not to return to Parkway. Magellan paid Quinn's salary for the rest of the school year, including while the investigation was ongoing, and Quinn was not charged with time off. Importantly, it was Magellan's role—not the District's— to pay and supervise Quinn, and to assign her to individual schools. In fact, the District did not have a contractual relationship with Ma- gellan. Quinn continued working for Magellan and was assigned to a different school district during the following 2021-22 school year. Quinn filed this suit near the end of the 2021-22 school year. The district court ultimately granted the District's motion for summary judgment as to both of Quinn's Title VI claims. As to the discrimination claim she brought on behalf of D.J.Q., the court reasoned that there was no direct or circumstantial evidence show- ing that Owen's actions were discriminatory, or that the District's response to the incident constituted deliberate indifference. Fi- nally, relying on Consolidated Rail Corp. v. Darrone, 465 U.S. 624, 632 n.13 (1984), the court ruled that Quinn and D.J.Q.'s Title VI retali- ation claims failed as a matter of law because they could not show that the primary objective of any Federal financial assistance re- ceived by the District was to provide employment.²Quinn timely appealed.

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II. STANDARD OF REVIEW

"We review the district court's grant of summary judgment de novo, construing all facts and drawing all reasonable inferences in favor of the non-moving party." Guevara, 127 F.4th at 828.

"Summary judgment is appropriate when no genuine dispute of material exists and a party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law." Id. at 828-29. "A dispute of fact is genuine if a reasonable jury could return a verdict for the non-moving party." Id. at 829.

"The mere existence of a scintilla of evidence in support of the plaintiff's position will be insufficient; there must be evidence on which the jury could reasonably find for the plaintiff." Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 252 (1986). In addition, a "district court's decision may be affirmed if the result is correct, even if the court relied upon an incorrect ground or gave a wrong reason."

Alvarez v. Royal Atl. Devs., Inc., 610 F.3d 1253, 1264 (11th Cir. 2010).

III. DISCUSSION

On appeal, Quinn argues that the district court failed to draw all reasonable inferences in her favor, which is required at summary judgment. Second, she contends that the district court failed to review her discrimination claim under the proper 2004). Instead, the question the district court answered was "whether the stat- ute 'grants [Quinn] the cause of action that [s]he asserts.'" Kroma Makeup EU, LLC v. Boldface Licensing + Branding, Inc., 920 F.3d 704, 708 (11th Cir. 2019) (quoting Bank of Am. Corp. v. City of Miami, 581 U.S. 189, 196-97 (2017)). This is not a jurisdictional inquiry, but rather a straightforward question of whether she presented a viable claim under Title VI. See id. (citing Lexmark Int'l, Inc. v. Static Control Components, Inc., 572 U.S. 118, 128-29 & n.4 (2014)).

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10 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 deliberate indifference standard. Third, she argues that the district court erred in its assessment of her Title VI retaliation claims. For the reasons that follow, we disagree with each of her arguments. We address the two types of claims—discrimination and re- taliation—separately. In doing so, we reject Quinn's argument that the district court applied the wrong standard for summary judg- ment. To the contrary, the district court recited the correct stand- ard for summary judgment and laid out the facts, both those which were undisputed and those which were disputed. The factual dis- putes Quinn identifies on appeal were either identified by the dis- trict court and taken in the light most favorable to Quinn, to no avail, or not genuine and material disputes—that is, none of the disputes she presses on appeal could lead a jury to "return a verdict for" her, "the non-moving party." Guevara, 127 F.4th at 829. In any event, we are reviewing the summary judgment record de novo and we agree with the district court's ultimate ruling based on our review, for the reasons that follow. Equal Emp. Opportunity Comm'n

v. STME, LLC, 938 F.3d 1305, 1322-23 (11th Cir. 2019) (explaining that we need not reverse harmless errors). We also note, as to both of her claims, Quinn does not argue that the record shows direct evidence of discrimination or retaliation, see, e.g., Buckley v. Hospital Corp. of America, 758 F.2d 1525, 1259-30 (11th Cir. 1985) (finding direct evidence of discrimination and distinguishing between direct and circumstantial evidence cases), so we address only the frame- works applicable to circumstantial evidence claims.

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 11

A. The District Court Properly Granted Summary Judgment on Quinn's Discrimination Claim.

As to Quinn's argument about her discrimination claim brought on behalf of D.J.Q.—that the district court applied the wrong framework —the district court considered the claim under both a McDonnell Douglas framework and a deliberate indifference standard. See Quinn v. Columbia Cnty. Sch. Dist., No. 1:22-cv-51, 2024 WL 2265764, at *5-8 (S.D. Ga. Mar. 12, 2024); see also McDon- nell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792 (1973). In doing so, the dis- trict court noted that there was some tension in our caselaw on which test was the most appropriate, but that, either way, the Dis- trict's motion for summary judgment was due to be granted. Ac- cordingly, Quinn is incorrect to assert that the district court applied the wrong framework, it applied each of the circumstantial evi- dence frameworks advanced by the parties and concluded they each justified summary judgment. See generally Tynes v. Fla. Dep't of Juv. Just., 88 F.4th 939, 944 (11th Cir. 2023) (Title VII context) ("McDonnell Douglas, in short, is an evidentiary tool that functions as a 'procedural device, designed only to establish an order of proof and production.'" (quoting St. Mary's Honor Ctr. v. Hicks, 509 U.S. 502, 521 (1993))); id. at 947 (explaining a court's ultimate "analysis turns on the substantive claims and evidence in the case, not the evidentiary framework"); id. at 954 (Newsom, J., concurring) (ex- plaining that "the decisive question" is whether "the summary- judgment record reveal[s] a genuine dispute of material fact about whether an employer discriminated against its employee because of a protected characteristic" (quotation and citation omitted)).

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12 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 Having reviewed the record, we also agree with the district court's application of these frameworks: the District was entitled to sum- mary judgment on Quinn's discrimination claim under any circum- stantial evidence framework.³

As to the McDonnell Douglas framework, the district court correctly concluded that Quinn could not establish a prima facie case of discrimination because she presented no evidence of a sim- ilarly situated comparator. We have explained that "a plaintiff pro- ceeding under McDonnell Douglas must show that she and her com- parators are similarly situated in all material respects." Lewis v. City of Union City, 918 F.3d 1213, 1226 (11th Cir. 2019) (en banc). The district court noted that the "only comparator" that Quinn had identified was Owens, who Quinn compared to herself. Yet, as noted at the outset, this discrimination claim was brought on be- half of D.J.Q., and there is no evidence of Owens (or other District employees) interacting with a student of a different race—or a stu- dent of the same race—under similar circumstances. Accordingly, the district court properly granted the District summary judgment under the McDonnell Douglas framework.

Generally, to show deliberate indifference, a plaintiff must show that a state actor "kn[e]w of and disregard[ed] an excessive—

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 13 that is, an extremely great—risk to the victim's health and safety."

L.S. ex rel. Hernandez v. Peterson, 982 F.3d 1323, 1330 (11th Cir. 2020) (quoting Waddell v. Hemerson, 329 F.3d 1300, 1306 (11th Cir. 2003)).

"A school district is not deliberately indifferent simply because the measures it takes are ultimately ineffective in stopping" discrimina- tory conduct. Sauls v. Pierce Cnty. Sch. Dist., 399 F.3d 1279, 1285 (11th Cir. 2005); see also Gebser v. Lago Vista Indep. Sch. Dist., 524 U.S. 274, 290 (1998) (explaining that, in the Title IX context, deliberate indifference is shown by conduct that amounts to "an official deci- sion by the [defendant] not to remedy the violation"). Yet, here, the record shows District's measures were somewhat effective; Owens was asked to apologize and she and D.J.Q. were separated and were able to complete the school year without any further re- ported incident. While Quinn argues that the initial lunchroom incident had a significant effect on D.J.Q., that does not show that the District's response to that incident was necessarily inadequate; a plaintiff can be significantly traumatized by an incident that a de- fendant appropriately redresses. Quinn argues the district court failed to recognize that the District's response to the lunchroom incident was prompted by her own measures and that Owens and D.J.Q. interacted after the incident. However, the question for de- liberate indifference is whether the District's response was inade- quate, not whether it was prompted by the District alone. For these reasons, the record does not show any material question of fact as to whether the District's response was so lacking so as to constitute "disregard" of D.J.Q.'s treatment by Owens. Sauls, 399 F.3d at 1285; Geber, 524 U.S. at 290.

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14 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 The district court did not separately analyze whether Quinn had shown a convincing mosaic of discrimination, which is yet an- other approach for assessing a discrimination case based on circum- stantial evidence at summary judgment. McCreight v. AuburnBank,

117 F.4th 1322, 1335 (11th Cir. 2024) ("[T]he McDonnell Douglas framework and the convincing mosaic approach are two paths to the same destination—the ordinary summary judgment stand- ard."). Yet, many of the same facts highlighted above also show that no convincing mosaic of discrimination is present here. Cf. Berry v. Crestwood Healthcare LP, 84 F.4th 1300, 1314-17 (11th Cir. 2023) (Abudu, J., concurring) (noting overlap between the McDon- nell Douglas framework and convincing mosaic approach in prac- tice). The record evidence about D.J.Q. specifically shows essen- tially two facts that might bear on a convincing mosaic approach:

(i) Owens's conduct toward D.J.Q. in January 2021; and (ii) Ow- ens's comments, on other unspecified occasions, that suggested ra- cial animus, including about there being "too many Mexicans in Walmart." While we agree with Quinn that Owens's conduct in January 2021 was troubling, there is insufficient record evidence suggesting that her treatment of D.J.Q. was based on his race. The only support for Quinn's race-based claim is her own testimony, over a month after the incident, that she believed the incident was racially motivated. Yet, this assertion, without more, does not cre- ate a genuine dispute as to any alleged bias and, therefore, no rea- sonable jury could find in Quinn's favor on this claim. Guevara,

127 F.4th at 829; Anderson, 477 U.S. at 252. Therefore, we affirm

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 15 the grant of summary judgment to the District on Quinn's Title VI discrimination claim.

B. The District was Entitled to Summary Judgment on Quinn's Retaliation Claims.

We turn next to the two retaliation claims. Quinn's retalia- tion claim on her own behalf raises a seemingly novel issue regard- ing the scope of Title VI.⁴Yet, we need not resolve that question because, even assuming that Quinn has such a cause of action un- der Title VI, summary judgment for the District was appropriate. In short, the record fails to show any genuine dispute of material fact as to whether the District retaliated against her.

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16 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 First, Quinn's retaliation claim suffers from a causation problem—her employer was Magellan, not the District, and none of her supervisors at Magellan are alleged to have acted retaliato- rily. Thus, even if we were to accept Quinn's contention that the District acted with a retaliatory intent in contacting Magellan to help "calm the situation," it was Magellan who made the decision to remove Quinn from Parkway based on a policy that the District was unaware of. To hold the District responsible for Magellan's decision, Quinn must show that the District "was the driving force behind" the retaliation she suffered, through what we have called a "cat's paw argument." Harris v. Public Tr. of Miami-Dade Cnty.,

82 F.4th 1296, 1301 (11th Cir. 2023). Yet the theory fails on these facts. Generally a cat's paw theory "requires evidence that the ul- timate (and manipulated) decisionmaker—the puppet—'followed the biased recommendation' of another—the puppeteer—'without independently investigating the'" situation. Id. at 1301 (quoting Stimpson v. City of Tuscaloosa, 186 F.3d 1328, 1332 (11th Cir. 1999)). Here the opposite is true: the District informed Magellan of the sit- uation, Magellan realized that a policy was violated and referred the incident to the federal government, who investigated the situ- ation and agreed with Magellan's recommendation that Quinn be transferred. Quinn has not presented evidence suggesting that ei- ther Magellan or the federal government undertook these investi- gations in a manner that was controlled, or "puppet[ed]," by the District. Id. Nor is there any evidence, especially considering the lack of contractual relationship between the District and Magellan, that the District did (or could) pressure Magellan. In fact, it is

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 17 undisputed that the District was unaware of Magellan's policies which prevented Quinn from working at the same school that her son attended.

Second, there is insufficient record evidence suggesting that Magellan's proffered reason for Quinn's transfer—Magellan's preexisting policy forbidding Magellan employees from working at schools their children attend—was pretext for retaliation. See id. at 1305 ("If [a] plaintiff establishes a prima facie case of retaliation, and the employer proffers a legitimate, nondiscriminatory reason for its actions, then the plaintiff must show that the employer's stated reason is pretextual."). "In assessing pretext, [we] 'must evaluate whether the plaintiff has demonstrated such weaknesses, implausi- bilities, inconsistencies, incoherencies, or contradictions in the em- ployer's proffered legitimate reasons for its action that a reasonable factfinder could find them unworthy of credence.'" Id. (quoting Combs v. Planation Patterns, 106 F.3d 1519, 1538 (11th Cir. 1997)). Quinn's argument on this point is that Magellan had not informed her about its policy and that the policy was misplaced because she could remain objective while working at the same school as her son.⁵As to the latter point, the wisdom of Magellan's policy is not

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18 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 before us; "[w]e do not sit as a super-personnel department and it is not our role to second-guess the wisdom of an employer's busi- ness decisions—indeed the wisdom of them is irrelevant—as long as those decisions were not made with a [retaliatory] motive."

Jimenez v. U.S. Att'y Gen., 146 F.4th 972, 997 (11th Cir. 2025) (quot- ing Alvarez, 610 F.3d at 1266). As to the former point, there is no evidence that Magellan was applying this policy in a retaliatory manner: Magellan's employee testified that the policy existed be- fore the decision in this case and there is no evidence any other Magellan counselors were in the same or similar situation as Quinn. Thus, because the policy represents a legitimate non-retal- iatory reason for Quinn's transfer, the sole fact that Magellan failed to inform Quinn of it before the facts of this case, while regrettable, does not suggest pretext. Harris, 82 F.4th at 1205. Quinn's retaliation claim brought on behalf of D.J.Q. fails for a different reason: Quinn has not identified any retaliatory adverse action that D.J.Q.—as opposed to Quinn—faced. See Johnson v. Mi- ami-Dade Cnty., 948 F.3d 1318, 1325 (11th Cir. 2020) ("To establish a prima facie case of retaliation, a plaintiff must show . . . that he suffered an adverse . . . action . . . ."). While D.J.Q. was undoubt- edly the subject of the January 2021 incident, which caused him harm and embarrassment, the record does not show he was retali- ated against for that incident or for reporting it. In other words, as she was unaware of this policy, her testimony on when it might have been developed is speculation. Id.

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24-11570 Opinion of the Court 19 the district court found, Quinn's retaliation claim was based on the District's treatment of Quinn, not of D.J.Q.

Finally, neither retaliation claim presents a convincing mo- saic of retaliation. See McCreight, 117 F.4th at 1335. Again, Quinn

"failed to provide sufficient evidence for a reasonable juror to infer that [retaliation] was the reason for her" transfer, id. at 1339, be- cause, among other things, the facts show independent investiga- tions by both the federal government and Magellan—so "no evi- dence of a failure to investigate" which might support a cat's paw theory, Harris, 82 F.4th at 1301—a non-retaliatory reason for Quinn's transfer, and a lack of any contractual agreement between Magellan and the District. Accordingly, while there are some fac- tual disputes, Quinn has not shown that these disputes, even when taken in the light most favorable to her, would allow a "jury [to] reasonably find for" her. Anderson, 477 U.S. at 252.

IV. CONCLUSION

The facts of this case are concerning, as a parent like Quinn should not have to worry that their child will face a physical alter- cation with a school employee while at school. However, there is no genuine dispute of fact precluding summary judgment on the claims Quinn brought against the District; the record does not sug- gest discrimination against D.J.Q., nor retaliation against either Quinn or D.J.Q. The record instead shows that the District at- tempted to resolve the concerns Quinn raised and appears to have

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20 Opinion of the Court 24-11570 been somewhat successful. For the reasons we have explained, we affirm the district court's judgment.

AFFIRMED.

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