Contract – Women’s College – Student Expectations

A group of female students who enrolled at Randolph-Macon Woman’s College expecting to attend a primarily single-sex college cannot sue the board of trustees for breach of contract when the college decided in 2006 to transition to coeducational, the Virginia Supreme Court holds.

Plaintiffs allege that when they accepted offers of admission, paid tuition and fees and registered for classes, a contract was formed between them and the college that included the promise, both express and implied, that if plaintiffs paid the tuition and fees and enrolled at the college, they would receive a four-year liberal arts education at a woman’s college.

When the trustees sought a bill of particulars, plaintiffs attached numerous documents to their bill of particulars that purportedly contain the contract, including letters of offers of admission, correspondence among the college’s representatives and the students, and the college’s 2005-07 academic catalog.

We hold plaintiffs failed to plead facts, which if established at trial, would demonstrates the existence of a contract that required the college to operate an academic institution predominantly for women during the four years plaintiffs expected to attend the college. Even though plaintiffs referenced numerous documents, this court has reviewed the documents and can find no such promise. There is no language in any of these documents in which the college made a clear, definite and specific promise to operate a college predominantly for women during the duration of plaintiffs’ academic studies at the college. We hold plaintiffs failed to plead the existence of a contract between the parties.

Nor do the colleges’ articles of incorporation form the basis of a contract between the students and the college.

Our narrow holding in this appeal is that plaintiffs failed to plead the existence of a clear, definite and explicit contract between plaintiffs and the college that required the college to provide a four-year education for plaintiffs in an academic environment predominantly for women.

Dissent

Lemons, J., joined by Russell, S.J.: I do not fundamentally disagree with the principles of law cited by the majority. I simply disagree with their application in this case.

I do not find the pleadings in this case to be either uncertain or incomplete. Especially troubling is the grant of a demurrer in the face of allegations of oral promises from the college to the students which can only be tested at trial. The students may or may not prevail at trial, but that question is not properly before us. The proper question is whether they alleged sufficient facts to survive demurrer. The record reveals they did; consequently, I respectfully dissent from the majority opinion and judgment of this court.

Dodge v. Trustees of Randolph-Macon Woman’s College (Hassell, J.) No. 070843, June 6, 2008; Lynchburg Cir.Ct. (Mosby) Wyatt Durrette Jr., Barrett E. Pope, Christine A. Williams for appellants; Edward J. Fuhr, Eric H. Feiler, Terence J. Rasmussen for appellee. VLW 008-6-060, 11 pp.