Award Upheld for Black Professor Denied Tenure

The state Supreme Court on Thursday left intact a damage award of more than $1 million to a former Claremont Graduate School assistant professor who said he was denied tenure because he is black.

Over one dissent, the justices refused to hear an appeal by school attorneys of a Los Angeles Superior Court jury verdict in favor of Reginald Clark, 42, now an instructor at Cal State Fullerton.

Clark had been at Claremont five years when he applied for tenure in 1984. At the time, there had never been a tenured African-American, Asian-American or Latino professor at the school. In the review process, one faculty committee voted 5 to 3 in his favor, but a higher committee voted against him 4 to 1.

Clark appealed to the school president, saying he had overheard members of the first committee make racist remarks, including one who said: “Us white folks have rights too.”