NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION File Name: 25a0081n.06
No. 24-1092
UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FILED FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT Feb 12, 2025 KELLY L. STEPHENS, Clerk ) CHEY DAVIS, ) ) Plaintiff-Appellant, ON APPEAL FROM THE ) UNITED STATES DISTRICT ) v. COURT FOR THE EASTERN ) DISTRICT OF MICHIGAN DELTA COLLEGE; JEAN GOODNOW, ) ) Defendants-Appellees. OPINION ) )
Before: SUTTON, Chief Judge; LARSEN and MURPHY, Circuit Judges.
LARSEN, Circuit Judge. Chey Davis taught English at Delta College. In 2019, Delta’s
then-president, Jean Goodnow, denied Davis a promotion to full professor. After Goodnow
retired, Delta’s new president, Michael Gavin, retroactively promoted Davis to full professor with
backpay. Soon thereafter, Davis quit teaching and sued Goodnow and the school, claiming that
the original promotion denial had been based on her race and her support for unionizing Delta’s
faculty. The district court awarded Delta and Goodnow summary judgment, and Davis appealed.
For the following reasons, we AFFIRM the district court’s grant of summary judgment.
I.
From 2007 until August 2022, Chey Davis, a black woman, taught English at Delta
College, a community college with several campuses in eastern Michigan. Davis primarily taught
freshman and remedial English. Delta promoted her to assistant professor in 2010, awarded her
tenure in 2012, and promoted her to associate professor in 2014. No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
In 2018, the Delta faculty initiated a vote on unionizing. Davis and two other faculty
members met with then-President Goodnow to notify her of the faculty’s plan. Davis alleges that
Goodnow became “extraordinarily angry and growled” at Davis and her colleagues. R. 25-3,
Davis Dep., PageID 989. Goodnow pounded her fist on a binder, which Davis assumed contained
the policies proposed by the pro-union contingent, and asked Davis and her coworkers whether
they “want[ed] to give this up.” Id. at 993.
Davis alleges that Goodnow, a white woman, exhibited hostility towards Davis in other
ways beyond opposing unionization. For instance, Davis says Goodnow spoke “aggressive[ly]”
to Davis in public meetings, “purposefully ignore[d]” Davis and other black faculty in the hallway,
and opposed some of Davis’s projects, including certain theatre productions and a visit to the Jim
Crow Museum. Id. at 986, 989, 1038. Moreover, Davis alleges that Goodnow generally treated
black faculty in a “stark[] and unsupportive” manner, which she says led to an “exodus” of black
professors and staff. Id. at 986, 988.
During the fall 2018 semester, Davis began preparing her application for promotion to full
professor. Under Delta’s promotion procedures for faculty hired before 2012, the first step is to
secure approval from the applicant’s faculty division and the division chair who provides a written
recommendation to the appropriate academic dean. The dean provides a recommendation to the
chief academic officer, who in turn makes a recommendation to Delta’s president. The president
then provides a recommendation to Delta’s Board of Trustees, which makes the final decision.
Throughout the process, the relevant promotion criteria are the candidate’s “[t]eaching
effectiveness,” “[e]ducational and professional growth,” additional “[p]roductive activity for the
College,” and leadership record. R. 17-8, Senate Handbook, PageID 519. The candidate must
demonstrate “excellence” in teaching effectiveness. Id.
-2- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
Davis passed the first several stages of promotion review, but her application stalled with
Goodnow. On April 5, 2019, Goodnow informed Davis that her promotion review would be
delayed, consistent with Delta Senate policy. Goodnow cited concerns with Davis’s teaching
effectiveness and leadership record. She noted that Davis’s application lacked student feedback—
which Goodnow considered important to a candidate’s ability to demonstrate “excellence” in
teaching effectiveness—and she believed Davis’s record did not reflect the level of leadership
required for promotion. Goodnow asked Davis to submit student feedback from 2015 to 2019 and
additional evidence of leadership. Two months later, in June 2019, Goodnow further delayed
Davis’s promotion decision, noting that Davis had failed to provide the requested materials. Later
that month, Goodnow received Davis’s “Student Feedback Summary,” though it included data
only from 2015 to 2017.
In August 2019, Goodnow informed Davis that she would be denying Davis’s request for
promotion to full professor, again citing a lack of “excellence in teaching effectiveness” and
leadership. R. 17-17, Aug. 2019 Memo, PageID 583. Eight days later, Davis filed a grievance
with an associate dean. In November 2019, Delta’s Grievance Committee recommended
reconsideration of Davis’s application. The Grievance Committee stated that Goodnow had
misapplied Senate policy by requiring Davis’s leadership “to relate to Delta College.” R. 17-19,
Grievance Comm. Memo, PageID 588. In December 2019, after again reviewing Davis’s
promotion packet and student-feedback forms, Goodnow denied Davis a promotion. Goodnow
encouraged Davis to reapply for promotion in the future, and she offered suggestions on how Davis
might strengthen her application. The record does not reflect that Davis further pursued a
promotion.
-3- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
In August 2021, Goodnow retired, and Dr. Michael Gavin succeeded her. In January 2022,
Gavin promoted Davis to full professor, deeming the promotion retroactive to July 1, 2019, and
awarding her backpay. Six months later, Davis resigned to pursue a career in social work.
In August 2022, Davis sued Delta and Goodnow in state court. She claimed race
discrimination under Michigan’s Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act (ELCRA) and First Amendment
retaliation under 42 U.S.C. § 1983.1 After Delta and Goodnow removed the case to federal court,
they sought summary judgment, which the district court granted. Davis timely appealed.
II.
We review a district court’s grant of summary judgment de novo. Dixon v. Gonzales, 481
F.3d 324, 330 (6th Cir. 2007). Summary judgment is warranted if the movant can show there’s no
genuine dispute of material fact and the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.
Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). We construe the evidence and make all reasonable inferences in the
nonmovant’s favor. Tingle v. Arbors at Hilliard, 692 F.3d 523, 529 (6th Cir. 2012). The party
opposing summary judgment must produce enough evidence to show that “a reasonable jury could
return a verdict” in her favor. Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 248 (1986).
1 Davis also brought an ELCRA claim alleging sex discrimination, but the parties stipulated to the claim’s dismissal in August 2023. Although Davis was retroactively promoted and awarded backpay, her claims remain live because she seeks non-economic damages, which are available under ELCRA even without underlying economic damages. See Hyde v. Univ. of Mich. Regents, 575 N.W.2d 36, 41 (Mich. Ct. App. 1997); Ronan v. Fam. Chiropractic & Wellness of Midland, PLLC, No. 352706, 2021 WL 2025182, at *2, *4–5 (Mich. Ct. App. May 20, 2021) (per curiam) (upholding a jury award of $150,000 in noneconomic damages under ELCRA, despite the jury awarding no economic damages). Emotional distress is also compensable under § 1983. See Bloch v. Ribar, 156 F.3d 673, 679 (6th Cir. 1998). -4- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
III.
A.
We start with Davis’s ELCRA claim. ELCRA says that an employer may not “[f]ail or
refuse to hire or recruit, discharge, or otherwise discriminate against an individual with respect to
employment, compensation, or a term, condition, or privilege of employment, because
of . . . race . . . .” Mich. Comp. Laws § 37.2202(1)(a).
In indirect-evidence cases, like this one, Michigan courts apply the McDonnell Douglas
burden-shifting framework. Hazle v. Ford Motor Co., 628 N.W.2d 515, 520–21 (Mich. 2001); see
McDonnell Douglas Corp. v. Green, 411 U.S. 792, 802–05 (1973). Under this framework, a
plaintiff must first make out a prima facie case of discrimination. Hazle, 628 N.W.2d at 521. The
employer must then present a legitimate, nondiscriminatory explanation for its action. Id. It then
becomes the plaintiff’s burden to “demonstrate that [the employer’s] articulated reason was merely
a pretext for unlawful discrimination.” Campbell v. Hum. Servs. Dep’t, 780 N.W.2d 586, 594
(Mich. Ct. App. 2009). Here, Goodnow presented a nondiscriminatory rationale for denying Davis
a promotion: Davis failed to demonstrate “excellence” in teaching effectiveness. So we may
proceed directly to the third step. Town v. Mich. Bell Tel. Co., 568 N.W.2d 64, 70 (Mich. 1997).
We ask whether Davis has produced sufficient evidence to permit the conclusion that race
discrimination, rather than a lack of teaching excellence, was Delta and Goodnow’s “true motive”
in denying her a promotion. Id. at 68.
A plaintiff can establish pretext by showing that the defendant’s explanation (1) lacked a
factual basis; (2) did not actually motivate the decision; or (3) was “insufficient to justify the
decision.” Dubey v. Stroh Brewery Co., 462 N.W.2d 758, 760 (Mich. Ct. App. 1990) (per curiam);
see also Major v. Village of Newberry, 892 N.W.2d 402, 413 (Mich. Ct. App. 2016).
-5- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
First, Davis alleges that Goodnow’s proffered reason lacked a factual basis. This argument
fails. Goodnow says she denied Davis a promotion because Davis scored poorly on
student‑feedback metrics, thereby not demonstrating the required “excellence” in teaching
effectiveness. Davis did, in fact, score poorly. Therefore, Goodnow’s explanation rests on solid
factual ground.
Under Delta’s promotion policy, “student evaluation of faculty” was one measure of
teaching excellence, along with “evaluation by division chair, . . . report by peer review team . . . ,
candidate’s personal appraisal, and any other evidence recognized by the division.” R. 17-9, Acad.
Promotion Guide, PageID 526. Two categories of data composed “student evaluation of
faculty”: (1) semester-by-semester course evaluations completed by a candidate’s current
students; and (2) former-student surveys completed during a candidate’s promotion process.
Course evaluations asked Delta students to answer questions like, “Did [the instructor] present
course materials understandably?”; “As a result of [the instructor’s] teaching, how much did you
learn?”; and “Would [you] recommend [this instructor] to other students?” R. 26-8, Lacina
Survey, PageID 1439–40. Students could select from a set of responses, like “Definitely yes,”
“Probably,” “Not sure,” and “Probably not” and assign a final rating of “Excellent,” “Good,”
“Fair,” or “Average.” Id. at 1440. Instructors were given student-evaluation “scores,” which Delta
calculated by adding the percentage of responses rating the instructor in either the first or second
most positive categories. For example, if 45% of students rated an instructor as “excellent” and
another 45% rated her as “good,” she’d receive a score of 90%. Candidates promoted to full
professor generally scored above 90% on the bulk of questions asked.
For instance, Davis presented as comparators two non-black English professors whom
Goodnow promoted to full professor: Ray Lacina and Betheen Glady-Teschendorf. Both scored
-6- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
above 90% on nearly all questions. For semester-by-semester feedback, Lacina scored above 90%
on all but one question, and 95.6% of students said they would recommend him to others. And he
scored above 90% on seven of eight questions sent to former students. Likewise,
Glady-Teschendorf, in semester-by-semester feedback from 2013 to 2019, scored above 90% on
twenty of twenty-two questions.
Davis, by contrast, scored much worse. Even though Goodnow had requested Davis’s
student feedback through 2019, Davis only submitted four semesters’ worth of data, dating from
2015 to 2017. In Davis’s best year, she scored above the 90% threshold on just eleven of
twenty-two questions; in her worst year, she hit the 90% target only twice; and her average across
the years was seven.2 Davis fared even worse on the former-student survey, scoring above 90%
on only one of nine questions. On the remaining eight questions, Davis scored above 80% only
once, the rest between 67 and 79%. Davis also received a litany of negative student comments.3
What’s more, Davis’s scores (and qualitative student reviews) were trending downward.
Goodnow reported that the negative comments constituted a pattern that she did not see in other
candidates for full professor; this led her to believe that Davis was not achieving her courses’
learning objectives.
Davis does not dispute the accuracy of either her numerical student-feedback scores or the
negative comments. And Gavin, Delta’s subsequent president who promoted Davis,
2 During the winter 2015 semester, Davis scored above 90% on only ten of twenty-two questions. In fall 2016, Davis scored above 90% on eleven of twenty-two questions. In winter 2016, Davis met the 90% threshold on only five of twenty-two questions. In fall 2017, Davis went two for twenty-two. 3 Negative student comments included concerns about course content (“Teach more English, how to properly write an essay.”) and course management (e.g., poor organization and failure to follow the schedule). To be sure, she received some positive qualitative feedback as well (“Chey Davis, you are amazing!”). -7- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
acknowledged that Davis’s scores were low. In sum, Goodnow’s proffered reason for denying
Davis a promotion did not lack a factual basis. Just the opposite: Davis scored poorly and received
substantial negative feedback. No reasonable juror could reject this conclusion.
Next, Davis alleges that Goodnow’s proffered reason did not actually motivate her
decision. Davis points to several pieces of evidence which, she says, suggest that Goodnow was
“looking for a reason” to reject her application and show that her lack of teaching excellence did
not actually motivate Goodnow’s decision. Appellant Br. at 39. For instance, Davis alleges that
Goodnow’s initial decision unfairly discounted her off-campus leadership. But Davis presents no
evidence suggesting that Goodnow considered other candidates’ off-campus leadership; to the
contrary, Dr. Reva Curry, a Delta vice president, testified that for promotion to full professor
Goodnow routinely demanded “that leadership . . . be to Delta College.” R. 17-6, Curry Dep.,
PageID 456.
Next Davis contends that Goodnow’s rationale changed over time. See Miles v. S. Cent.
Hum. Res. Agency, Inc., 946 F.3d 883, 890 (6th Cir. 2020) (“[A]n employer’s shifting termination
rationales are evidence that the proffered rationale may not have been the true motivation for the
employer’s actions.”). But Goodnow’s rationale did not meaningfully shift. Goodnow’s initial
decision noted both Davis’s lack of teaching excellence and lack of leadership. After Davis
contested the leadership determination, that rationale dropped away, but Goodnow’s
student-feedback rationale remained constant throughout. And Delta policy required applicants
for full professor to demonstrate teaching excellence.
Davis alleges that Goodnow’s focus on Davis’s student-evaluation scores was
“inconsistent” with Delta’s promotion policy and that Goodnow ignored everything else.
Appellant Br. at 41. But Delta’s Academic Promotion Guide lists “student evaluation of faculty”
-8- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
as a measure of teaching effectiveness. R. 17-9, Acad. Promotion Guide, PageID 526. Certainly,
another president might have emphasized this measure less than Goodnow—in fact, Gavin appears
to have done so by promoting Davis despite her low scores. But Delta policy doesn’t dictate how
an evaluator must weigh student-feedback scores against other measures of teaching effectiveness.
Goodnow reasonably viewed student-feedback scores as an important metric of teaching
excellence. And, critically, she consistently applied the same promotion standards to Davis and
other applicants.
Davis takes issue with Goodnow for not considering that she taught developmental English,
a subject that sometimes produced less positive student feedback. But Davis presents no evidence
suggesting that Goodnow viewed other candidates’ scores in a subject‑specific context. That
includes Glady‑Teschendorf, who taught the same courses as Davis but scored markedly higher.
So Davis’s assertions don’t give rise to an inference that Goodnow treated Davis less favorably
than non-black candidates. Davis might take umbrage with how Goodnow reviewed all promotion
applications, but that casts no doubt on Goodnow’s explanation for why she denied Davis a
Finally, Davis points out that Curry recommended her for promotion. At Goodnow’s
deposition, Davis’s counsel asked Goodnow whether she thought “Curry wasn’t being objective”
in evaluating Davis’s application because “Curry is also black.” R. 26-1, Goodnow Dep., PageID
1367. Goodnow responded, “I think that thought crossed my mind.” Id. When asked why,
Goodnow said:
Well, because of how [Curry] talked with me about it, about how she was struggling. And because she and I had some wonderful conversations in the past about diversity and our shared commitment to diversity, and I think it was a struggle for her in this particular situation, so I think it was hard, I think it was – I think it was real difficult for her.
-9- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
Id. But Curry herself testified that she did not think Goodnow’s evaluation of Davis’s application
was at all race based. Moreover, Goodnow invited Davis to reapply for a promotion later and
suggested how Davis could improve her application. This too suggests a lack of pretext.
In sum, Davis has not raised a genuine issue that race, rather than a lack of teaching
excellence, motivated Goodnow’s decision to deny Davis a promotion. Davis’s qualitative and
quantitative teaching evaluations were dramatically lower than those of other candidates who were
promoted, even those who taught the same classes as Davis. And there is no evidence suggesting
that Goodnow applied different criteria to judge Davis’s application compared to her peers. It is
true that many people at Delta felt Davis deserved a promotion, including Goodnow’s successor.
But the bare fact that Goodnow disagreed with her colleagues about Davis’s application does not
establish that Goodnow constructed her student-feedback rationale as a cover for racial
discrimination. All it shows is a difference of opinion between Goodnow and others at Delta on
how much weight to place on student evaluations. To succeed on an ELCRA claim, however,
“[t]he plaintiff cannot simply show that the employer’s decision was wrong or mistaken, since the
factual dispute at issue is whether discriminatory animus motivated the employer, not whether the
employer is wise, shrewd, prudent, or competent.” Town, 568 N.W.2d at 72 (citation omitted).
B.
We turn now to Davis’s First Amendment retaliation claim. Davis alleges that Goodnow
refused to promote her because she supported unionizing Delta’s faculty. To establish a First
Amendment retaliation claim, a plaintiff must show (1) she engaged in protected conduct; (2) the
defendant took an adverse action against her; and (3) a causal connection. DeCrane v. Eckart,
12 F.4th 586, 594 (6th Cir. 2021). We assume that Davis’s pro-union advocacy constituted
-10- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
protected conduct4 and that the promotion denial was an adverse action. Even so, Davis cannot
establish a retaliation claim because she cannot show causation.
A First Amendment plaintiff may recover under § 1983 only if her protected speech was a
but-for cause of the defendant’s adverse action. See Lemaster v. Lawrence County, 65 F.4th 302,
309 (6th Cir. 2023). To establish causation, a plaintiff must first show that her speech “was a
substantial or motivating factor of” the adverse action. Id. (internal quotation marks and citations
omitted). She may do so by presenting direct or circumstantial evidence “reasonably linking” the
protected speech and adverse action. Rodgers v. Banks, 344 F.3d 587, 602 (6th Cir. 2003) (citation
omitted). If Davis successfully establishes each element, the burden shifts back to the defendants
to show that the decision to reject Davis’s application “would have been the same absent the
protected conduct.” Sowards v. Loudon County, 203 F.3d 426, 431 (6th Cir. 2000). In other
words, the defendant “must prove the absence of but-for causation.” Lemaster, 65 F.4th at 309
(emphasis omitted).
The district court held that Davis failed to show a causal connection between her pro-union
activity and Goodnow’s decision to deny Davis a promotion. We agree.
We typically begin our causation inquiry by analyzing the time gap between the protected
speech and the adverse action. Id. at 310. The longer the gap, “the more evidence that a plaintiff
must offer to show that the speech motivated the [adverse] action.” Id. A long gap alone may
doom a plaintiff’s ability to show causation. Fuhr v. Hazel Park Sch. Dist., 710 F.3d 668, 676 (6th
Cir. 2013) (stating that a “multi-year gap proves fatal” to establishing causation). On the other
4 The First Amendment protects public-employee speech only if the employee (1) addresses a matter of public concern and (2) speaks as a private citizen rather than pursuant to her job duties. See DeCrane, 12 F.4th at 594. If both prongs are met, we balance the employee’s interest in speaking against the employer’s countervailing operational interests. Id. Because we hold that Davis cannot show causation, we need not address whether she engaged in protected conduct. -11- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
hand, a very short gap (i.e., mere days or weeks) “can sometimes (if rarely)” be enough to permit
an inference of causation. Lemaster, 65 F.4th at 310; see also Sensabaugh v. Halliburton, 937
F.3d 621, 630 (6th Cir. 2019). When neither extreme applies, we ask whether the plaintiff has
presented enough additional evidence of retaliation to survive summary judgment. See Lemaster,
65 F.4th at 310.
Here, the gap was more than a year. Davis informed Goodnow of the faculty’s intent to
unionize in summer 2018. Goodnow did not deny Davis a promotion until August 2019, and that
decision did not become final until December 2019.5 A year-long gap between protected conduct
and adverse action is certainly far too long for a court to infer causation based on temporal
proximity alone. And while it may not be so long as to automatically doom Davis’s claim,6 see
5 Davis argues that the relevant date of the adverse action is March 2019, making the gap between protected conduct and adverse action seven months. In March 2019, Goodnow told Curry that she did not plan to promote Davis, and she notified Davis in April 2019 that she was delaying the decision whether to recommend her for promotion. But Davis’s proffered date—March 2019— cannot possibly be the relevant one. A supervisor who informs a subordinate third-party of her intention to reject another employee’s promotion application does not take any adverse action against the employee. An “adverse action” in the context of a First Amendment retaliation claim is “one that would ‘deter a person of ordinary firmness’ from the exercise of the right at stake.” Thaddeus-X v. Blatter, 175 F.3d 378, 396 (6th Cir. 1999) (en banc) (opinion of Moore, J.) (citation omitted). Examples in the employment context include a “discharge, demotion[], refusal to hire, nonrenewal of [a] contact[], and [a] failure to promote.” Id. These actions are all formal decisions carrying negative consequences for an employee—unlike an employer either musing to a colleague about what action she may later take or informing an employee of her intent to delay a promotion decision. Thus, March 2019 is not the relevant date. 6 Our caselaw does not make clear exactly when, and under what circumstances, a temporal gap is so long that it entirely fails as proof of causation. In Fuhr, we held that a two-year gap “prove[d] fatal.” 710 F.3d at 675. But otherwise, Fuhr offered little guidance on where to draw the line. In George v. Youngstown State University, we considered a Title VII retaliation claim brought by a professor who sued his employer alleging retaliation and age discrimination after he was terminated from his position as an assistant professor in 2015. 966 F.3d 446, 453 (6th Cir. 2020). George had previously sued the school in 2006, after he was denied tenure, and that 2006 lawsuit constituted protected conduct. Id. at 452. Despite the nine-year gap between the original lawsuit and the 2015 termination, we concluded that the gap did not automatically preclude George from demonstrating causation. Id. at 460–61. Over a dissent citing Fuhr, the panel counseled against -12- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
Fuhr, 710 F.3d at 675–76, the long gap increases Davis’s burden to offer additional evidence “to
show that the speech motivated the action.” Lemaster, 65 F.4th at 310; see Vereecke v. Huron
Valley Sch. Dist., 609 F.3d 392, 400 (6th Cir. 2010).
Davis resists this conclusion, arguing that the lengthy gap between her speech and the
promotion decision should not cut against a finding of causation because Goodnow retaliated at
her first meaningful opportunity. The first-meaningful-opportunity doctrine functions as an
exception to the general rule that a lengthy delay vitiates a finding of causation. See Kirilenko-Ison
v. Bd. of Educ., 974 F.3d 652, 665 (6th Cir. 2020). But the exception applies only when the alleged
retaliator had no prior opportunity to retaliate. For example, in Dixon v. Gonzales, we held that
the plaintiff, Dixon, could not show causation because he was within Reutter’s (the alleged
retaliator) chain of command for several years, yet Reutter took no adverse action against him.
481 F.3d 324, 335–36 (6th Cir. 2007). During that time, Reutter “could have easily exercised his
authority . . . as Dixon’s superior,” as Reutter signed off on Dixon’s performance evaluations. Id.
at 336.
Goodnow served as President for more than a year after Davis’s pro-union advocacy yet
took no action against Davis. Davis asserts that Goodnow had no prior opportunity to retaliate
against her, but she does not support that assertion with any factual detail. This lack of record
evidence cuts against Davis. She bears the burden of establishing that her protected speech
motivated Goodnow’s decision to deny her a promotion. See Lemaster, 65 F.4th at 309. Thus,
she must present enough factual material to permit the inference that Goodnow retaliated at her
“draw[ing a] bright line rule[].” Id. at 461. This court noted that the employer had financial incentives to employ George until the end of the 2014–15 academic year because a previous settlement agreement between the parties required Youngstown State to provide George with medical coverage if they fired him before spring 2015. Id. at 460. We noted that the close temporal proximity to the end of George’s settlement coverage suggested that the firing was retaliatory. Id. -13- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
first meaningful opportunity. In other words, she must present some evidence to show that
Goodnow couldn’t have retaliated earlier. She has not done so. Davis does not present any factual
detail showing that Goodnow acted at her first meaningful opportunity.
In sum, the year-long gap between Davis’s speech and her promotion denial is too long to
infer causation based on temporal proximity alone, and the first-meaningful-opportunity exception
does not apply here. Therefore, Davis must “supplement h[er] claim with other evidence of
retaliatory conduct.” Vereecke, 609 F.3d at 400 (internal quotation mark and citation omitted); see
also Mickey v. Zeidler Tool & Die Co., 516 F.3d 516, 526 (6th Cir. 2008) (noting that additional
evidence of retaliatory conduct “has commonly included evidence of additional discrimination”
post-protected activity and pre-adverse action). And because the gap here is long, that evidence
must be fairly strong to survive summary judgment.
Davis’s circumstantial evidence of causation is quite weak. She first points out that when
Davis first informed Goodnow of the faculty’s plan to unionize, Goodnow became “extraordinarily
angry and growled” at Davis, pounding her fist on a binder. R. 17-3, Davis Dep., PageID 219.
And Goodnow referred to Davis and her fellow union activists as “troublemakers.” R. 25-10,
Randolph Declaration, PageID 1322. Karen Randolph, Delta English professor and chair of
Davis’s promotion committee, said she “strongly believe[d]” this label stemmed from the trio’s
pro-union activity. Id. While these events provide some indicia of how Goodnow viewed faculty
unionization, they are weak evidence of causation because they occurred at least seven months
before Goodnow first denied Davis a promotion in August 2019 (and at least eleven months before
-14- No. 24-1092, Davis v. Delta College
the denial became final in December 2019).7 Beyond this, Davis offers only a December 2018
email exchange between Goodnow, Curry, and an adjunct faculty member, which Davis says
reveals Goodnow’s intolerance of dissent. But that exchange does not show causation because it
is eight-to-twelve months removed from the non-promotion decision and completely unrelated to
Davis.
Davis presents no other evidence from which a reasonable juror could conclude that the
union issue motivated Goodnow’s promotion decision. Again and again, Goodnow’s
communications both to Davis and others focused on her low scores and lack of leadership.
In sum, Davis fails to produce enough circumstantial evidence for a reasonable juror to
conclude that her pro-union efforts were a substantial or motivating factor in Goodnow’s decision.
Davis was not denied a promotion for at least a year after she engaged in protected speech. That
gap is far too long for temporal proximity to alone establish causation. And Davis’s additional
circumstantial evidence is too weak for a reasonable juror to conclude that her pro-union advocacy
motivated Goodnow’s decision.
***
We AFFIRM.
7 Because the faculty voted to unionize in January 2019 and Randolph says she heard Goodnow use the “troublemakers” nickname while she and Davis worked to organize the faculty union, presumably Randolph heard Goodnow use the nickname between summer 2018 and the unionization vote in January 2019. -15-