In Everett v. New York City Department of Education et al, 2022 WL 2342693 (S.D.N.Y. June 29, 2022), the court, inter alia, dismissed plaintiff’s hostile work environment claim asserted under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.
The court summarized the black-letter law as follows:
Title VII prohibits requiring people to work in a discriminatorily hostile or abusive environment. To state a race-based claim for a hostile work environment, the plaintiff “must plead facts that would tend to show that the complained of conduct: (1) is objectively severe or pervasive—that is, creates an environment that a reasonable person would find hostile or abusive; (2) creates an environment that the plaintiff subjectively perceives as hostile or abusive; and (3) creates such an environment because of the plaintiff’s race.
Title VII is violated when the workplace is permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, and insult that is sufficiently severe or pervasive to alter the conditions of the victim’s employment and create an abusive working environment. To determine whether an environment is hostile or abusive, the Court considers all the circumstances, including the frequency of the discriminatory conduct; its severity; whether it is physically threatening or humiliating, or a mere offensive utterance; and whether it unreasonably interferes with an employee’s work performance. The hostile work environment may result from a single incident that was extraordinarily severe, or a series of incidents that were sufficiently continuous and concerted to have altered the conditions of the plaintiff’s working environment. But isolated incidents or ‘episodic’ stray remarks are not ‘sufficiently continuous and concerted in order to be deemed pervasive. [Cleaned up.]
Applying the law, the court explained:
Here, the Complaint alleges only discrete instances of conduct by Defendants that, even if proven to be true, would not rise to the level of a workplace permeated with discriminatory intimidation, ridicule, or insult. For example, Everett alleges that her supervisors ignored her at two different meetings, Yesnick told her that teaching might not be the right profession for her, and Liso cursed at her on one occasion and mocked her accent and hair on a few occasions. These allegations represent distinct instances that are not sufficiently “continuous and concerted” nor “severe or pervasive” to establish a hostile work environment. See, e.g., Boyar v. Yellen, No. 21-507, 2022 WL 120356, at *3 (2d Cir. Jan. 13, 2022) (rejecting argument that there was a hostile work environment when “supervisor (1) told [Plaintiff] to go back to his desk or she would wring his neck”; (2) yelled at him demanding his employee identification number now; (3) ignored him at a meeting; (4) yelled at him very loudly; and (5) told him he had 90 minutes to complete two certification exams, when he had 60 minutes to complete each” (cleaned up)); Brown v. N.Y.C. Dep’t of Educ., No. 20 Civ. 2424 (VEC) (OTW), 2021 WL 4943490, at *12 (S.D.N.Y. Aug. 31, 2021) (“[C]ourts in this Circuit have consistently held that allegations of even constant reprimands and work criticism by themselves are not sufficient to establish a hostile environment claim.” (quotations and alteration omitted)), report and recommendation adopted, 2021 WL 4296379 (S.D.N.Y. Sept. 20, 2021); Perez v. N.Y. State Off. of Temp. & Disability Assistance, No. 14 Civ. 1621 (SAS), 2015 WL 3999311, at *7 (S.D.N.Y. June 30, 2015) (“Allegations of negative job evaluations or excessive reprimands are insufficient to establish a hostile environment claim.” (quotations omitted)). [Cleaned up.]
Having dismissed plaintiff’s federal claim, it declined to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over plaintiff’s state and city law claims.
The court did, however, issue the dismissal without prejudice, and granted plaintiff leave to amend her complaint.