College terminated employment of instructor on short-term contract after poor performance evaluation
This instalment of You Make the Call involves a dispute over the termination of a college instructor’s contract.
Frederic Ntibarimungu was a payroll professional hired by Vancouver Career College in January 2006 to be an instructor. His contract outlined specific courses he would teach and the college was “under no obligation to provide ongoing employment other than to fulfill the conditions” of the list of courses from January to February 2006, which the college reserved the right to amend. The contract stipulated the term of the contract was indefinite but the college could terminate it at any time and provide payment in lieu of notice according to statutory minimums if there was no cause for dismissal.
In August 2007, the college offered Ntibarimungu another contract to teach courses from September 2007 to Jan. 7, 2008. The contract was almost identical to Ntibarimungu’s 2006 contract. Ntibarimungu signed the contract when it was presented to him on Aug. 15 without reviewing it or requesting a copy.
Early in the fall 2007 school term, the college received complaints about Ntibarimungu’s teaching. The campus manager sat in on his class and afterwards made a suggestion about encouraging student participation.
A month later, the college received more complaints about Ntibarimungu’s attitude towards his students and the manager spoke with him again about encouraging them.
By mid-November, there didn’t seem to be an improvement and the campus manager decided things weren’t going to change. She started looking for another instructor to finish the term. On Nov. 16, Ntibarimungu was given a notice of termination that stated his contract was being terminated on Nov. 30 because of “upcoming changes in the program” and an instructor with “another skills set” was needed. Because the two weeks’ notice was the statutory minimum stipulated in the contract, Ntibarimungu was not given any severance pay.
Ntibarimungu sued the college for wrongful dismissal and breach of contract, including a claim for aggravated damages due to bad faith by the college. He claimed he was treated differently from other instructors because someone was always watching him in class and reporting back to the college. He also said his contract was indefinite and could only be terminated for cause.
Was Ntibarimungu wrongfully dismissed?
OR
Was the college allowed to terminate the contract with two weeks’ notice?
If you said Ntibarimungu was wrongfully dismissed, you’re right. The British Columbia Provincial Court gave particular importance to the fact the college brought its concerns to Ntibarimungu as part of a course of corrective action, but he wasn’t given enough of an opportunity to change and save his job. Therefore, his teaching attitude was not sufficient cause for dismissal.
Since the court found there was not sufficient cause, he was entitled to reasonable notice. It determined his employment with the college was on short-term contracts rather than a permanent, continuous basis and the applicable start date of his employment was the day he signed his last contract: Aug. 15, 2007. Therefore, he was entitled to payment for the balance of his contract, which was Jan. 7, 2008, despite the clause stipulating he was only entitled to the statutory minimum notice.
“The general principle in law is that wrongfully dismissed employees on fixed-term contracts are not entitled to reasonable notice but rather to the balance due under their fixed-term contract,” said the court.
