The Case of the Missing Professor

Update: the missing professor, who has been identified as Professor Henderson, has emailed to congratulate the students who made it onto law review. We have a request out to the Dean asking for comment on whether the changing of grades to Pass/Fail has disadvantaged the 1L students chances to get onto law review.

Sally Student is a "rising 2L" at Boyd School of Law, a state-run facility located in the state of Nevada. Sally studied for 10 hours a day, 7 days a week during her 1L year, and put up with a variety of pointless hypotheticals posed to her by various professors.

Sally had good grades and was hopeful that she would obtain a position on Boyd's "law review" so that she could obtain her dream job - corporate document review monkey at a large insurance defense firm.

Sally did well her first semester, and felt good about her second semester exams as well. During the summer, four out of Sally's five classes reported her grades, but more than a month after grades were due her Constitutional Law grade had not yet been posted. Sally heard rumors that her Constitutional Law professor, Annie Absentee, had "disappeared." Sally's fears were confirmed when she was sent the following email from the Dean:

From: John.White@unlv.edu
Date: July 9, 2009 11:28:54 AM PDT
Subject: Constitutional Law I grades

Dear Rising 2L's,

It is possible you have heard a rumor that some first year grades are not yet available and that those classes missing the grades may be graded on a pass/fail basis. I write to confirm the basics of this rumor and clarify what has occurred.

The BSL Registrar has received all grades except grades in two sections of Constitutional Law I. Despite efforts, we have been unable to determine the status of the grades for those two sections. We understand that this is a serious inconvenience to you and potentially disruptive to your plans. Consequently, we have taken the interim step of asking another Constitutional Law Professor to grade the papers on a pass/fail basis so that we may create rankings. We expect to have those grades by early next week at the latest.

It is our hope that the professor who has not turned in grades has in fact graded them or is nearing completion of grading them. However, we have no way to know at this time what the status of those grades is. Should we receive grades by Monday (when we expect to receive the pass/fail grades) we will use them. If we do not receive them by Monday, we will utilize the pass/fail grades, calculate rankings, and move forward.

Please accept my sincere apology for this most unfortunate situation. Please trust that we are taking all appropriate steps to see that grades for the missing classes are submitted in short order. I believe that grading exams in a timely fashion is among the faculty's most significant obligations; consequently, I am extremely troubled by this situation and am taking every step possible to remedy it and will be taking additional steps to ensure something like this does not happen in the future.

Regretfully,

Dean White

Sally reasonably expected to receive an "A" in Con Law. Now that she will be graded on a pass/fail basis, however, her class ranking, journal status, scholarship and job prospects are all likely to be affected. Sally has come to you seeking advice as to her rights and the possibility of filing suit against Boyd for losing her law professor.

Prepare a short comment discussing any and all possible legal implications for Sally, Boyd, Annie, White or any other prospective parties you can think of.

(Thanks Tipster!)